REESE  LIBRARY 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 


,190 


83043 


'.   Class  No. 


OUTLINE 


OF 


THE    PHILOSOPHY 


OF 


ENGLISH    LITERATURE 


BY 

GREENOUGH    WHITE   A.M.   B.D. 


PART  I 
THE   MIDDLE   AGES 


BOSTON  U.S.A.  AND  LONDON 

GINN    &    COMPANY    PUBLISHERS 

1895 


COPYRIGHT   1895 
BY  GREENOUGH   WHITE 

ALL   RIGHTS   RESERVED 


TO 


HARVARD    UNIVERSITY 

IN   TOKEN    OF   GRATITUDE 
FOR   THE    LIBERALLY   ACCORDED    USE 
OF  THE   TREASURES    OF   ITS    LIBRARY 

WITHOUT  WHICH   THIS    COULD    NOT   HAVE   BEEN   WRITTEN 

AND    FOR   THOSE    EARLIER    INTELLECTUAL  OPPORTUNITIES 

THAT   FURNISHED    ITS    FIRST   SUBSTANCE 

THIS   WORK   IS    PRESENTED 

BY   A   LOYAL   ALUMNUS 


83043 


PREFACE. 

IN  view  of  the  excellent  treatises  upon  English  literature  that 
have  multiplied  of  late  years  until  they  form  by  themselves  a 
veritable  library,  the  only  excuse  that  the  present  work  can 
allege  for  being  is  that  in  it  the  great  subject  is  considered 
under  a  somewhat  new  light.  To  describe  the  process  of  men- 
tal development;  to  determine  the  limits  and  character  of 
literary  ages ;  to  get  at  the  basal  principle  of  each  successive 
age  and  trace  its  derivation  from  that  which  preceded  it,  — 
such  has  been  the  motive  of  the  work.  The  lives  of  authors, 
therefore,  have  not  been  a  primary  concern,  yet  it  is  hoped  that 
the  personal  element  in  literary  history  has  not  been  unduly 
depressed  and  that  the  leading  characteristics  of  men  of  com- 
manding and  formative  genius  have  been  firmly  grasped  and 
forcibly  presented. 

It  is  best  to  explain  at  the  outset  that  in  prosecuting  his 
endeavor  the  author  has  welcomed  any  light  that  contemporary 
history,  literature  or  art  seemed  to  afford ;  he  has  refused  to 
regard  any  event  in  the  progress  of  European  civilization  as 
not  germane  to  the  subject  and  has  selected  many  facts  that 
may  at  first  sight  seem  remote  from  it  to  illustrate  his  theme. 
The  result  may  prove  to  have  a  reflective  value  ;  for  in  laying 
European  history  under  contribution  in  order  to  interpret  Eng- 
lish literature,  that  literature  in  its  turn  may  make  the  course 
of  contemporary  history  more  perspicuous. 


vi  PREFACE. 

In  this  First  Part  of  the  work  in  particular,  which  treats  of 
the  ages  known  as  mediaeval,  the  author  will  never  regret 
any  pains  he  has  taken  if  he  be  deemed  to  have  been  success- 
ful in  breaking  up  the  stark  unity  which  those  great  and  mis- 
understood ages  —  so  often  dismissed  as  Feudal  and  Catholic 
—  present  to  many  minds ;  in  unfolding  the  mighty  movement 
that  went  on  in  them  and  discovering  in  some  measure  the 
source  of  their  subtle  attraction  ;  and  in  showing  how  great  is 
the  value  they  possess  for  culture  —  a  value,  indeed,  which 
nothing  that  preceded  them  can  supply. 

It  is  right  to  add  that  the  above  was  written  in  Cambridge 
the  last  day  of  the  year  1892,  when  the  work,  since  subjected 
to  repeated  revision,  seemed  to  be  approaching  completion. 

CHARLESTON 
February  1895. 


OUTLINE  OF  THE  PHILOSOPHY  OF  ENGLISH 
LITERATURE. 


INTRODUCTION. 

IT  is  customary  to  begin  treatises  upon  English  literature 
with  an  account  of  Anglo-Saxon,  or  as  some  of  late  prefer  to 
say,  Old  English  writings.  Without  detracting  in  the  least 
from  the  value  of  the  study  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  language  as  an 
intellectual  discipline,  from  its  necessity  for  a  complete  knowl- 
edge of  English,  from  the  importance  and  interest  of  some  of 
its  literary  remains,  one  may  question  whether  it  is  truly  scien- 
tific thus  to  identify  Anglo-Saxon  with  English  literature; 
whether  it  conduces  to  clearness,  or  tends  to  obscure  differ- 
ences and  cause  confusion ;  whether  without  affectation  a  work 
can  be  included  in  English  literature  which  an  intelligent  Eng- 
lishman of  the  present  day  can  enjoy  only  in  translation,  unless 
he  would  take  all  the  pains  necessary  for  learning  a  foreign 
language.  Acquaintance  with  Latin  is  necessary  for  a  thorough 
knowledge  of  Italian,  —  but  histories  of  Italian  literature  do  not 
therefore  begin  with  Ennius.  And  yet  the  connection  between 
Latin  and  Italian  literature  is  exceedingly  close,  and  the  influ- 
ence of  the  ancient  upon  the  modern  authors  has  been  over- 
whelming, —  while  the  influence  of  Anglo-Saxon  upon  English 
literature  has  been  just  nothing.  It  was  as  late  as  the  year 
1832  that  the  treasures  of  the  Vercelli  book,  among  them 
Cynewulf's  best  work,  were  first  made  known  to  the  world ; 
the  same  year  Benjamin  Thorpe  edited  and  translated  Caed- 
mon's  Scripture  paraphrase ;  the  year  following  J.  M.  Kemble 


2  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

brought  out  the  first  English  edition  of  Beowulf,  and  thus  at 
last  made  that  noble  epic,  the  most  precious  relic  of  Anglo- 
Saxon  poetry,  accessible  to  students,  and  by  a  prose  translation 
of  it  in  1837  first  unfolded  its  beauties  to  the  general  reader. 
In  1842  Thorpe  edited  the  collection  known  as  the  Exeter 
book.  Thus  at  last  the  body  of  that  old  poetry  was  brought  to 
the  light  of  day,  and  yet,  a  full  generation  later,  an  Anglo-Saxon 
scholar  could  complain  of  the  slow  awakening  of  interest  in  the 
subject,  and  the  unaccountable  neglect  of  that  ancient  litera- 
ture in  its  native  land. 

That  neglect  is  sufficiently  explained  by  the  lack  of  original- 
ity which,  with  the  brilliant  exception  of  Beowulf,  pervades  the 
whole  mass  of  Anglo-Saxon  composition.  There  are  passages 
of  power  and  beauty  in  Caedmon  and  Cynewulf, — but  on  the 
whole  one  cannot  fail  to  be  struck  by  the  absence  of  native 
energy  and  invention,  which  leaves  to  the  body  of  that  compo- 
sition a  purely  antiquarian  interest,  and  thus  deprives  it  of  the 
right  claimed  for  it  by  some  near-sighted  scholars  to  be  re- 
garded as  genuine  literature.  A  glance  at  those  old  writings 
will  reveal,  beside,  the  difficulties  that  beset  any  attempt  at  a 
philosophical  history  of  them  ;  for  their. arrangement  fluctuates 
with  the  tides  of  criticism,  an  important  piece  being  assigned 
by  different  authorities  to  different  generations  or  centuries 
even ;  nothing  is  known  about  the  authors  of  some  of  the  most 
important  works,  and  little  that  is  certain  about  those  whose 
names  are  known.  These  facts,  lack  of  original  thought,  and 
uncertainty  about  dates  of  composition,  —  to  which  we  may 
add  the  gaps  in  the  literary  record,  —  render  a  philosophical 
interpretation  of  the  phases  of  the  literature  almost  impractica- 
ble. A  survey  of  its  main  divisions  gives  evidence,  however, 
in  a  general  and  unsatisfactory  way,  of  a  certain  movement. 

Before  and  above  all  its  relics  stands  the  epic  of  Beowulf,  — 
the  solitary  finger  of  the  sun  that  rises  from  the  Saxon  plain  to 
take  rank  among  the  mighty  monuments  of  world  literature. 


OF   ENGLISH   LITERATURE.  3 

The  tale  possesses  a  deep  and  ever  vital  interest,  in  that  it  is  a 
record  of  the  conflict  between  heathen  and  Christian  ideas  in 
the  Teutonic  mind ;  and  as  it  reflects  the  passage  of  Saxons 
and  Angles  over  the  wild  North  Sea  from  their  old  to  their  new 
home,  so  too  it  marks  the  great  transition  from  faith  to  faith, 
—  in  it  we  may  see  the  revolution  in  belief  in  very  process. 

The  most  significant  antithesis  of  ideas  in  this  old  poem, 
this  Christian  graft  upon  a  heathen  stock,  is  that  of  the  two 
explanations  of  world  history  offered  by  Fate  and  by  Provi- 
dence that  divided  the  author's  and  redactor's  minds.  That 
man's  life  is  bound  by  fate  is  the  thought  that  lies  deepest  in 
the  mind  of  the  hero  Beowulf  as  he  prepares  for  the  deadly 
conflict  with  the  monster  Grendel,  —  but  at  last  he  decides  to 
lay  aside  his  weapon  and  to  wrestle  with  the  foe,  leaving  the 
outcome  of  the  fight  to  the  disposition  of  the  all-wise  God,  the 
holy  Lord.  Over  and  over  again  the  poet  expresses  his  faith 
in  a  righteous  and  all-powerful  God  of  battles,  the  true  gov- 
ernor of  human  affairs,  —  and  yet  at  the  end,  when  Beowulf  is 
about  to  die  by  the  fire-dragon's  bite,  it  is  said  that  his  Weird, 
that  is,  his  Fate,  was  approaching.  In  one  place  the  poet  tries 
to  overcome  the  antithesis  by  identifying  the  blind  Fate,  the 
gloomy  Destiny  of  heathendom,  with  the  holy  will  of  the  per- 
sonal sovereign  of  the  world :  Fate,  he  says,  is  the  Providence 
of  God. 

The  thought  about  nature  revealed  in  the  poem  is  of  deep 
interest,  and  shows  that  in  the  convert's  mind  his  former  gods 
did  not  cease  to  be,  but  were  simply  metamorphosed  into 
demons,  and  believed  to  haunt  the  fens,  moors,  crags,  and 
waste  places  of  the  earth.  He  seems  to  have  thought  that 
powers  of  nature  malignant  to  man  were  directed  by  evil  spir- 
its. The  dreadful  Grendel  is  a  sort  of  personification  of  the 
deadly  miasma  of  the  marshes,  and  of  any  other  natural  influ- 
ence hostile  to  human  life.  He  towers  at  last  to  the  dimen- 
sions of  a  Satan ;  he  is  an  outcast,  dwelling  in  darkness  and 


4  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

the  shadow  of  death,  tormented  by  sight  and  sound  of  human 
happiness ;  he  stalks  over  marsh  and  moor  with  a  company  of 
monsters,  giants,  and  ogres,  —  the  brood  of  Cain;  he  is  the 
abomination  that  makes  desolate,  the  foe  of  man,  at  once  the 
thrall  and  the  thane  of  hell,  the  adversary  of  God.  Yet  he  re- 
tains something  of  human  form,  —  he  is  a  Caliban,  only  more 
ghastly ;  he  destroys  thirty  warriors  in  one  night.  Night  is  the 
time  when  the  fire-dragon  flies  abroad,  when  fiends  have  power, — 
they  flee  at  the  approach  of  dawn.  By  night  the  splendid  hall 
of  Hrothgar  is  deserted ;  the  king  and  his  train  come  trooping 
back  by  day.  This  horror  of  darkness  and  joy  in  the  daylight 
illustrate  the  dualism  that  underlies  the  whole  work;  its  theme 
is  the  ancient  conflict  between  good  and  evil. 

One  striking  touch  is  the  gladness  of  nature  when  Grendel's 
horrid  dam,  the  hag  of  the  mere,  whose  home  is  a  cavern  un- 
der a  torrent,  is  slain  by  Beowulf  with  a  magic  sword ;  instantly 
the  sunlight  grows  brighter,  the  turbid  water  clears. 

The  lingering  influence  of  heathenism  is  shown  by  those 
warriors  who  seek  to  save  themselves  from  Grendel  by  propi- 
tiating the  goblins,  by  sacrificing  to  idols ;  '  They  knew  not  God,' 
is  the  stern  comment  of  the  poet.  At  last  Beowulf  is  sent  to 
destroy  the  pest,  by  the  high  grace  of  the  holy  God. 

Beautiful  is  the  picture  of  the  friendly  relations  of  Beowulf 
and  his  band  and  the  sage  old  King  Hrothgar ;  beautiful  the 
stately  courtesy  of  the  queen  to  the  hero.  Throughout  the 
poem  loyalty  is  lauded  as  the  crown  of  human  virtue,  the  very 
bond  of  social  life;  disloyalty  receives  the  severest  condemna- 
tion. Charming,  too,  are  the  scenes  of  mirth  in  the  royal  hall ; 
the  warriors  and  their  guests  seated  at  long  tables  decked  with 
barbaric  gold,  passing  around  ornamented  ale-cups  and  flagons, 
while  gold-embroidered  hangings  wave  along  the  walls. 

The  next  most  important  relic  of  Anglo-Saxon  poetry  is 
Caedmon's  paraphrase  of  portions  of  the  books  of  Genesis 
and  Exodus,  the  story  of  Daniel  and  the  Three  Children,  and 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  5 

fragments  of  a  life  of  Christ.  The  fall  of  the  rebel  angels  and 
the  rage  of  Satan  are  described  with  spirit  and  power ;  the  fall 
of  man  is  boldly  told,  with  interesting  variations  from  the  Biblical 
account ;  but  after  that  the  paraphrast  becomes  tame  and  dull, 
goes  lumbering  through  the  genealogies,  sticks  closely  to  his 
text,  —  not  attempting,  for  instance,  to  harmonize  the  conflict- 
ing details  in  the  story  of  the  flood.  The  escape  of  the  chil- 
dren of  Israel  from  Egypt  is  more  freshly  treated.  Though  of 
far  less  value  than  Beowulf,  this  paraphrase,  with  its  variations, 
is  significant  by  reason  of  its  deep  earnestness  of  tone ;  in  those 
two  works  we  seem  to  see  the  Teutonic  mind  coming  to  its-elf. 

It  ought  to  be  said  that  Caedmon's  poem  is  regarded  by 
scholars  as  a  composite  work,  traces  of  many  hands  being 
found  in  it;  also  that  neither  it  nor  the  tale  of  Beowulf  are 
extant  in  manuscripts  older  than  the  tenth  century,  —  later  by 
many  ages  than  the  originals,  and,  moreover,  written  in  a  dif- 
ferent dialect  from  theirs. 

About  the  time  when  those  poems  were  being  composed, 
that  is,  at  the  end  of  the  seventh  century  and  throughout  the 
first  generation  of  the  eighth,  the  erudite  and  saintly  Bede  — 
the  glory  of  the  Northumbrian  monasteries  —  was  preparing  in 
Latin  a  veritable  encyclopaedia  of  the  knowledge  of  his  age. 
The  most  remarkable  passage  in  his  works  is,  perhaps,  the 
account  in  the  "Ecclesiastical  History"  of  Brother  Drithelm 
and  his  vision  of  hell.  Bede  finished  while  on  his  death-bed  a 
translation  into  the  vernacular  (long  since  lost)  of  the  Gospel 
of  St.  John. 

To  the  same  period,  probably,  belong  the  poems  of  Cynewurf ; 
but  which  and  how  many  they  are,  and  who  Cynewulf  was,  are 
still  vexed  questions  among  scholars.  That  ancient  bard  is 
indeed  a  problematical  character  ;  he  has  roamed  like  a  rest- 
less ghost  through  centuries  far  apart,  appearing  now  in  the 
latest,  now  in  the  earliest  period  of  the  literature.  He  has 
been  identified  as  an  abbot  of  the  eleventh  century,  as  a  bishop 


6  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

of  the  eighth,  and,  finally,  all  ecclesiastical  rank  has  been 
denied  him.  To  increase  our  uncertainty,  there  has  been  a 
tendency  to  attribute  to  him  almost  all  the  floating,  anonymous 
minor  poems  in  the  language  ;  beside  his  Riddles,  the  Phoenix, 
and  Elene  —  the  Finding  of  the  Cross,  —  Andreas,  Crist, 
Juliana,  Guthlac,  and  the  Wanderer  have  been  fathered  upon 
him.  His  case  is  a  notable  example  of  the  difficulty  that 
attends  any  attempt  at  a  reliable  interpretation  of  the  develop- 
ment of  the  literature.  The  genuine  specimens  of  Cynewulf's 
work  that  have  come  down  to  us  possess  considerable  beauty 
of  thought  and  style ;  they  show  that  their  author  derived  real 
pleasure  from  the  gentler  aspects  of  nature  :  his  ideal  land- 
scape was  a  smooth  plain,  green  and  flowery  and  dotted  with 
sunny  groves,  under  a  bright  sky  traversed  by  little  clouds. 

With  the  lamentable  decay  in  Northumbrian  power  and  pros- 
perity that  was  going  on  through  the  eighth  century,  a  shadow 
fell  upon  Anglo-Saxon  literature  that  rested  upon  it  for  more 
than  a  hundred  years.  And  yet  that  was  the  period  of  the  rise 
of  the  power  of  Wessex,  under  Egbert,  who  had  spent  many 
years  at  the  court  of  Charles  the  Great,  in  company  with  his 
countryman  Alcuin  —  the  leading  scholar  of  his  age  in  the 
west,  —  and  had  returned  in  the  year  800  to  assume  the  crown, 
and  to  put  in  practice  as  far  as  he  could  what  he  had  learned 
from  the  example  of  Charles.  By  the  year  827,  the  authority 
of  King  Egbert  was  recognized  over  all  England ;  and  his  able 
administration,  his  military  and  political  success,  must  have 
been  accompanied,  it  would  seem,  by  some  intellectual  awaken- 
ing. We  should  expect  at  this  epoch  some  manifestation  of 
interest  in  the  operations  of  the  mind,  some  study  of  logic  and 
the  laws  of  thought,  and  therewith  a  development,  however 
slight,  of  the  critical  faculty,  and  of  argumentative  composition. 
The  age  of  great  poetry  being  past,  we  should  look,  with  the 
study  of  grammar  and  rhetoric,  for  the  formation  of  a  good 
prose  style.  Some  evidence  of  observation,  if  not  investigation, 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  7 

of  external  nature  might  be  expected :  the  motions  of  sun, 
moon,  and  stars,  of  winds  and  rivers  and  the  sea,  the  proper- 
ties of  plants  and  minerals,  the  habits  of  animals.  Already  the 
Arabians  were  beginning  their  chemical  studies,  and  were 
fascinated  by  watching  the  effect  of  herbs  and  minerals  upon 
the  human  system.  With  his  training  and  executive  ability 
and  capacity  for  organizing,  it  might  be  supposed  that  Egbert 
would  introduce  in  his  realm  of  Wessex  a  more  thorough  and 
comprehensive  system  of  education  ;  that  he  would  teach  his 
people  the  benefits  of  an  improved  economy,  and  would  en- 
courage agriculture  and  handiwork  of  all  sorts  and  the  erection 
of  better  buildings  ;  and  that  in  every  way  he  would  promote 
social  stability  and  domestic  comfort.  But  if  there  was  move- 
ment in  any  or  all  of  these  directions,  we  have  no  literary  or 
architectural  proofs  of  it.  This,  to  be  sure,  does  not  prove 
that  there  was  no  such  movement  —  for  fire  destroys  both 
books  and  buildings,  and  Egbert's  reign  went  out  in  the  dark- 
ness of  Danish  invasion.  The  probability  is,  however,  that 
there  was  no  great  intellectual  activity  in  that  age  ;  perhaps 
King  Egbert  found  that  he  could  not  communicate  to  a  back- 
ward people  the  ideas  that  he  had  gathered  at  the  court  of 
Charles  the  Great,  and  so  left  much  to  be  done  by  his  grand- 
son Alfred,  fifty  years  later. 

That  noble  prince,  steadfast,  wise,  and  good,  the  very  per- 
sonification of  moral  energy,  was  nourished  as  a  boy  upon  the 
songs  of  his  native  land  and  language ;  and  was  of  himself 
sufficient  to  create  a  literary  age.  In  tranquil  intervals  amid 
his  Danish  wars,  while  engaged  in  recovering  his  realm  from  bar- 
barism, in  rebuilding  cities  and  restoring  arts  and  commerce, 
he  made  time  to  do  an  astonishing  amount  of  literary  work. 
He  translated  for  the  instruction  of  his  people  the  History  of 
the  World  by  Paulus  Orosius,  a  Spanish  churchman,  contem- 
porary and  friend  of  St.  Augustine  ;  the  Pastoral  Care  of  Pope 
Gregory  I  ;  Bede's  Ecclesiastical  History ;  and  (most  signifi- 


8  OUTLINE    OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

cant  of  all)  Boethius'  Consolation  of  Philosophy.  The  aim  of 
this  latter  work  is  to  inculcate  self-knowledge  and  self-mastery : 
it  discusses  the  supreme  good,  the  problem  of  evil,  vice  and 
virtue,  misery  and  happiness,  and  seeks  to  reconcile  the  free- 
dom of  the  human  will  with  God's  foreknowledge.  Various 
comments  of  his  own  which  the  king  incorporated  in  his  trans- 
lation show  what  a  strong  interest  he  felt  in  those  great  themes. 
It  will  be  seen  that  Alfred's  work  partakes  of  the  imitative 
nature  of  Anglo-Saxon  writing  in  general ;  none  of  it  is  original, 
except  the  annotations  just  mentioned,  and  an  account  of  the 
voyages  of  Ohthere  and  Wulfstan  which  he  added  to  his  trans- 
lation of  Orosius.  Yet  by  his  labors  he  became  the  father  of 
Anglo-Saxon  prose-style.  In  his  time,  too,  the  meagre  entries 
of  the  ancient  Chronicle  become  more  copious,  and  swell  it 
into  a  record  worthier  of  the  national  history. 

The  next  literary  epoch  was  shaped  by  the  influence  of  great 
ecclesiastics  like  Odo  and  Dunstan,  who  elevated  the  altar 
above  the  throne,  controlled  the  course  of  political  events,  and 
brought  their  church  into  closer  conformity  to  the  Roman 
model.  The  central  point  in  their  policy  may  be  divined  to 
have  been  the  introduction  of  the  doctrine  of  transubstantiation, 
in  support  of  which  miracles  even  were  alleged :  it  was  cur- 
rently reported  that  once,  while  Odo  was  breaking  the  con- 
secrated bread,  great  drops  of  blood  fell  from  it — to  the 
confusion  of  the  incredulous.  In  this  respect  those  English 
churchmen  shared  in  the  general  heightening  of  dogma  that 
was  in  progress  upon  the  continent  of  Europe.  Odo  was  trans- 
lated from  the  see  of  Sherborne  to  the  archbishopric  of  Can- 
terbury in  the  year  942 ;  the  year  following,  Dunstan  was 
appointed  abbot  of  Glastonbury.  The  cathedral  of  Canterbury 
was  rebuilt  at  this  time. 

Upon  the  death  of  Odo,  Dunstan  was  raised  to  the  primacy 
in  961,  and  was  the  ruling  spirit  throughout  the  reign  of  Edgar. 
With  the  king's  help  he  restored  many  monasteries  all  over  the 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  9 

land,  naturalized  the  Benedictine  order,  and  ejected  secular 
canons  from  cathedral  chapters,  putting  monks  in  their  place. 
This  last  measure  was  carried  out  at  Winchester  by  Bishop 
Ethelwold,  in  the  teeth  of  furious  opposition  ;  it  was  approved, 
however,  by  a  voice  that  seemed  to  come  from  the  great 
crucifix.  In  this  reign  the  practice  of  receiving  the  sacrament 
fasting  was  canonically  enforced. 

The  long  and  remarkable  career  of  Dunstan,  as  monk,  artist, 
and  musician,  scholar,  and  ecclesiastical  statesman,  came  to  a 
close  in  the  year  988. 

Such  were  some  of  the  conditions  under  which  the  new  liter- 
ature arose ;  and  its  most  celebrated  names  were  those  of 
ecclesiastics,  ^Elfric  and  Wulfstan.  It  was  almost  exclusively 
religious  in  its  character,  consisting  of  sermons,  translations 
of  the  Scriptures,  a  paraphrase  of  the  Psalms,  and  lives  of 
saints  ;  and  it  was  chiefly  4rujprose,  —  the  most  conspicuous 
exception  to  the  character  thus  given  of  it  being  the  spirited 
song  of  the  fight  at  Maldon,  in  the  year  991. 

^Elfric  was  a  pupil  of  Bishop  Ethelwold,  and  taught  grammar 
in  the  school  at  Winchester.  Eighty  homilies  of  his  have  come 
down  to  us,  fine  specimens  of  pure  and  mellow  Saxon  prose; 
in  composing  them  he  depended  largely  upon  the  writings  of 
the  Fathers  of  the  church,  freely  translating  and  compiling  from 
their  stores.  He  translated  beside  the  first  seven  books  of  the 
Old  Testament.  ^Elfric  was  made  an  abbot;  he  has  even 
been  identified  (erroneously,  as  it  seems  to  many)  with  the 
archbishop  of  Canterbury  of  that  name,  who  died  in  1006. 
One  homily  of  his,  though  not  original,  is  important  as  giving 
evidence  of  a  reaction  in  the  mind  of  the  English  church 
against  the  recent  development  of  eucharistic  doctrine  and 
toward  the  ancient,  spiritual  view. 

Wulfstan,  archbishop  of  York  from  1002  to  1023,  composed 
homilies  in  a  rugged,  picturesque  style  quite  different  from 
ic's;  in  one  fervent  address,  of  great  interest  and  value, 


10  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

he  describes  the  forlorn  condition  of  the  country  under  the 
oppression  of  its  Danish  marauders.  The  political  and  social 
outlook  was  so  dark,  indeed,  that  it  seemed  to  both  those 
preachers  as  if  the  coming  of  Antichrist,  the  day  of  doom,  and 
the  end  of  the  world  were  near. 

The  sun  of  the  Saxon  state,  after  suffering  a  long  eclipse 
during  the  supremacy  of  the  Danes,  shone  out  again  with  a 
pathetic,  evening  light  in  the  time  of  Edward  the  Confessor, 
and  set  forever  upon  the  field  of  Hastings.  By  the  year  1071, 
the  Norman  conquest  of  England  was  complete :  and  Saxon 
nationality,  as  a  freely  developing,  self-conscious  entity,  as  an 
end  in  itself,  existed  no  more.  Its  extinction  is  fitly  typed  in 
the  failure  of  the  male  line  of  the  Saxon  kings.  The  church, 
too,  was  involved  in  the  ruin  of  the  state :  native  bishops  were 
ejected  from  their  sees  to  make  room  for  foreigners,  —  a 
process  significantly  illustrated  by  the  deposition  of  Stigand, 
native  archbishop  of  Canterbury,  and  the  installation  of  Lan- 
franc,  an  Italian,  in  the  year  1070.  Canterbury  cathedral  was 
destroyed  by  fire  in  the  first  year  of  the  Norman  conquest,  —  a 
loss  that  seriously  impairs  our  knowledge  of  Saxon  architecture. 
The  national  literature  participated,  inevitably,  in  the  general 
decline ;  yet  it  lingered  on,  a  thin  stream,  ever  ready  to  die  in 
the  sand,  until  the  middle  of  the  following  century.  Some  homi- 
lies were  written  and  the  Chronicle  was  brought  down  to  the  year 
1154  —  when,  with  the  Norman  dynasty,  it  too  came  to  an  end. 
And  then  ensued  a  period  of  half  a  century  which  is  practically 
a  total  blank  in  the  history  of  composition  in  the  language  of 
the  conquered  people.  A  few  more  homilies  belong  to  that 
period,  composed  in  a  dialect  already  so  far  removed  from 
the  form  of  the  Saxon  classics  that  those  who  spoke  it  could 
no  longer  understand  the  earlier  writings :  ^Elfric's  homilies 
had  to  be  modernized  for  their  benefit.  Anglo-Saxon  language 
and  literature  had  shrunk  into  a  possession  for  monastic 
antiquaries. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  11 

Even  from  a  survey  as  swift  as  this  of  ours  has  just  been  it 
is  apparent  that  these  compositions  form  a  distinct  literary 
department  which  cannot  legitimately  be  merged  in  any  other 
but  must  be  isolated  for  special  study.  To  understand  and 
enjoy  this  literature  a^special  discipline  is  necessary :  the 
language  must  first  be  learned  —  a  language  which  those  who 
know  most  about  it  admit  to  be  totally  new  and  strange  to  the 
Englishman  of  to-day,  only  to  be  acquired  by  long  study.  By 
reason  of  its  peculiar  form  Anglo-Saxon  verse  especially  is 
hard  to  understand, — as  much  so  indeed  as  difficult  German. 
The  literature,  moreover,  is  circumscribed  in  its  scope  ;  Beowulf 
alone  soars  into  the  empyrean  of  universal  poetry ;  for  the  rest 
it  consists  almost  entirely  of  paraphrases,  translations,  and 
homilies  largely  compiled  from  foreign  sources,  for  the  sake  of 
a  special  audience  in  a  period  long  since  gone  by.  Its  work 
has  long  been  done  ;  it  is  now  of  interest  only  to  the  philologist, 
the  antiquarian,  the  student  of  Saxon  civilization.  It  is  a 
literature  at  second-hand,  for  the  Saxon  mind,  assimilative, 
imitative,  cared  chiefly  about  the  reproduction  of  the  thought 
of  stronger  minds.  And  finally,  the  gaps  in  the  record,  and 
our  ignorance  or  uncertainty  about  the  authorship  or  approxi- 
mate date  even  of  much  that  remains,  are  such  that  the  result 
of  the  most  patient  attempt  at  a  philosophical  interpretation  of 
it  must  still  be  somewhat  unsubstantial.  Fresh  discoveries  and 
closer  agreement  among  critics  must  precede  any  complete  and 
comprehensive  theory  of  its  development. 


12  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 


I. 

IN  the  twelfth  century  the  intellect  of  England  found  expres- 
sion in  Latin  and  Norman- French,  and  though  works  composed 
in  those  languages  cannot,  of  course,  be  included  in  English 
literature  merely  because  they  sprang  on  English  soil,  and 
though  at  first  sight  they  seem  further  removed  from  it  than 
the  Saxon  classics  even,  yet  in  reality,  from  a  literary  point  of 
view,  some  of  them  are  much  nearer,  being  allied  to  it  in 
subject :  in  them  appeared  those  images  of  chivalry  and  devo- 
tion that  have  swum  in  enchanting  vision  before  the  eyes  of 
great  English  poets ;  have  stirred  the  emotions  of  myriads  of 
hearers  and  readers,  and  still  have  power  to  charm  ;  that  run 
like  a  golden  chain  through  all  these  seven  centuries  of  English 
literature,  binding  them  in  one, — the  tales  of  Arthur  and  his 
knights  of  the  Round  Table,  of  Lancelot  and  Galahad  and  the 
search  for  the  mystic  Grail. 

The  charm  of  those  old  stories,  the  surpassing  beauty  and 
mystery  of  the  conception  of  the  Grail,  invite  us  to  consider 
the  genius  of  the  age  from  which  they  sprang. 

For  several  generations  there  had  been  in  progress  a  remark- 
able religious  revival,  which,  beginning  silently  in  centres  far 
apart,  had  gradually  widened  in  influence  and  gathered  such 
strength  that  at  the  close  of  the  eleventh  century  it  gave  a  dis- 
tinctive character  to  the  age.  As  far  back  as  the  close  of  the 
tenth  century  a  young  nobleman  of  Ravenna  named  Romuald 
was  suddenly  converted  from  a  worldly  to  an  ascetic  life ;  he 
exerted  an  extraordinary  influence  upon  all  who  came  in  con- 
tact with  him,  and  converted  many,  so  that  he  became  at  last 
the  founder  of  a  new  brotherhood  :  he  left  his  cell  in  the 
Ravennese  marshes,  in  the  year  1009,  to  found  a  monastery  at 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  13 

Camaldoli,  in  the  region  of  Arezzo.  Even  before  his  time  the 
monks  of  Clugny,  in  Burgundy,  had  developed  an  intense 
religious  zeal  which  told  at  last  upon  the  papacy  itself,  and 
raised  it  from  the  turpitude  into  which  it  had  fallen  :  in  1049, 
a  brother  of  Clugny  mounted  the  papal  throne  as  Leo  IX,  and 
carried  out  stringent  reforms,  with  the  aid  of  his  friend  and 
counsellor,  also  a  brother  of  the  order,  the  mighty  Hildebrand. 
In  1038,  a  Florentine  named  Gualbert,  inspired  by  a  visit  to 
Camaldoli,  started  in  Vallombrosa  —  a  vale  of  willows  —  a 
fraternity  pledged  to  observe  in  all  its  strictness  the  primitive 
rule  of  Benedict.  Several  affiliated  houses  were  soon  formed ; 
at  the  time  of  the  founder's  death,  in  1073,  there  were  twelve 
in  the  order.  Still  the  deepening  of  the  religious  life  went  on  ; 
the  enthusiasm  for  starting  new  orders  continued  unabated ;  in 
1084,  Bruno  of  Cologne  founded  in  a  desolate  site  near 
Grenoble  the  first  Carthusian  monastery,  to  which,  following 
an  example  set  by  Gualbert,  he  admitted  lay  brethren;  in  1098, 
an  aged  Benedictine  monk  named  Robert  started  in  a  wood  at 
Citeaux,  in  the  neighborhood  of  Dijon,  a  brotherhood  which, 
after  it  was  joined  by  the  fervent  young  Bernard,  in  1113,  out- 
rivalled  all  others  in  popularity.  Soon  after,  Bernard  became 
abbot  of  an  affiliated  house  which  he  had  founded  in  the  wild 
valley  of  Clairvaux.  His  genius  dominated  the  age;  for  a 
generation  he  exercised  throughout  Europe  a  primacy  of  piety. 
Norbert  of  Cleves,  cousin  and  almoner  of  the  Emperor  Henry 
IV,  was  converted  from  a  life  of  luxury  to  one  of  rigorous 
asceticism  in  consequence  of  an  accident  which  had  nearly 
proved  fatal  to  him  :  while  out  riding  one  day  he  was  over- 
taken by  a  fearful  thunderstorm,  and  was  thrown  by  his  horse, 
terrified  at  lightning  which  struck  near  at  hand.  Donning 
beggar's  clothes,  Norbert  travelled  about  in  Germany  and 
Brabant,  preaching  repentance.  On  Christmas  day  of  the  year 
1 12 1  he  established  forty  monks  in  a  spot  which  had  been 
shown  him  in  a  vision,  —  the  lonely  wooded  valley  of  Pre- 


14  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

montre.  This  was  the  germ  of  the  Premonstratensian  order, 
which  soon  ramified  over  Europe,  and  exerted  great  influence. 
At  the  same  time,  Gilbert  of  Sempringham,  in  Lincolnshire,  — 
the  only  English  founder  of  an  order,  —  instituted  one,  chiefly 
for  women,  which  was  known  by  his  name.  At  meals,  Gilbert 
always  had  beside  him  what  he  called  "  the  dish  of  the  Lord 
Jesus,"  in  which  he  put  aside,  for  the  poor,  the  best  of  what- 
ever was  on  the  table. 

The  spiritual  fervor  of  these  ascetics  ;  their  phantasmal  view 
of  nature ;  their  abnormal  mode  of  living,  —  their  prolonged 
silence,  fasts,  and  vigils ;  their  periods  of  rapt  contemplation  ; 
the  beautiful  services  in  which  they  took  part,  —  the  chant- 
ing of  the  hours  at  evening  and  in  the  night-time,  —  all  tended 
to  produce  occasional  conditions  of  ecstasy,  especially  when, 
after  long  fasting,  in  a  state  of  physical  and  mental  tension, 
they  assisted  at  what  was  the  supreme  event  of  their  life  and 
worship,  the  celebration  of  the  mass.  About  that  their  visions 
clustered  thickest,  and  serve  to  render  intelligible  to  us  the 
apparition  of  the  Grail.  Thus,  for  example,  a  young  Norman 
nobleman  named  Walthen,  who  joined  the  Cistercians  at 
Rievaulx  Abbey,  and  died  as  abbot  of  Melrose  in  the  year 
1 1 60,  once,  while  celebrating  mass,  saw  the  host  in  his  hands 
vanish  into  the  figure  of  the  infant  Jesus,  who  smiled  upon  him, 
and  was  changed  into  the  host  again. 

Beside  this  religious  strain,  the  next  most  important  char- 
acteristic of  the  age  was  the  spirit  of  warlike  adventure  which 
the  Normans  infused  into  Europe.  Their  bounding  blood, 
their  fresh  activity  found  relief  in  voyages  of  discovery,  in  free- 
booting  expeditions  and  feats  of  arms,  which  easily  took  on  a 
religious  cast,  and  the  freebooter  became  a  pilgrim,  combining 
the  congenial  search  for  further  adventure  with  the  search  for 
relief  from  the  consciousness  of  past  crime.  Robert  the  Mag- 
nificent (also  called  the  Devil),  father  of  William  the  Conqueror, 
who  lies  under  grave  suspicion  of  having  poisoned  his  brother 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  15 

in  order  to  attain  the  ducal  crown,  died  in  Asia  Minor  upon 
his  return  from  a  pilgrimage  to  the  Holy  Land.  The  Normans 
were  indefatigable  pilgrims,  —  many  doubtless  from  compunc- 
tion of  conscience ;  many  drawn  by  mere  religious  glamour 
blended  with  the  longing  to  see  strange  lands ;  many  from  a 
desire  to  dignify  or  make  decent  with  a  pious  motive  their  aim- 
less search  for  adventure,  their  plundering  expeditions  even. 

Now  just  at  the  time  when  Norman  power  was  in  the 
ascendant,  and  when  the  new  birth  of  devotional  enthusiasm 
was  urging  increasing  numbers  of  pilgrims  and  penitents  to- 
ward the  Holy  Land,  the  fierce  Seljuk  Turks  got  possession  of 
the  holy  places,  and  made  access  to  them  difficult  and  danger- 
ous. This  was  all  that  was  wanting  to  fire  the  zeal  of  the 
enthusiast,  to  make  the  blood  of  the  Norman  boil :  the  tide  of 
pilgrimage,  checked  by  the  barbarities  of  the  Turks,  steadily 
mounted  against  the  barrier  until  at  last  it  poured  over  it  in  the 
First  Crusade.  The  main  motive-power  of  the  Crusades  was 
the  instinctive  conviction,  rooted  ineradicably  in  the  human 
breast,  that  there  are  places  where  man  can  draw  nearer  to 
God  than  he  can  elsewhere  ;  and  to  the  mind  of  that  age  Pales- 
tine was  preeminently  the  place  where  heaven  touched  the 
earth.  The  crusading  armies,  spite  of  all  alloy  of  baser 
motives,  were  in  reality  pilgrim  hosts,  going  armed  that  they 
might  repel  force  by  force,  and  obtain  for  themselves  and 
others  unimpeded  access  to  the  scenes  of  the  Saviour's  life. 
That  chivalrous  devotion  to  the  person  of  Christ  and  loyalty  to 
his  memory  that  were  the  very  flower  of  the  feudal  age,  that 
blind  feeling  after  his  humanity  and  longing  to  make  it  real  to 
mind  and  heart  that  inspired  the  Crusades,  certainly  make 
those  mighty  movements  deeply  affecting  as  well  as  impressive. 
It  was  the  thought  of  Incarnation,  indeed,  which  gave  to  that 
and  succeeding  ages  their  strange  spiritual  glow,  midway  be- 
tween the  gloom  of  the  dusk  ages  and  the  glare  of  modern 
times.  On  the  eve  of  the^  First  Crusade  the  saintly  Anselm 


16  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

began  in  England  and  finished  in  a  Calabrian  monastery  his 
epoch-making  treatise  —  a  conspicuous  sign  of  the  stir  of  a 
new  intellectual  life  in  Western  Europe  —  in  which  he  grounded 
the  necessity  of  the  Incarnation  upon  the  facfrof  sin. 

In  the  armed  devotion  of  the  Holy  Wars,  in  which  bishop 
and  baron,  monk  and  knight  took  part,  we  see  revealed  the 
very  form  and  pressure  of  the  time.  Emotional  self-abandon- 
ment was  the  note  of  the  era ;  men  were  extreme  in  whatever 
they  did.  The  swing  of  the  soul  from  tumults  of  military 
ferocity  to  a  tumult  of  devotion  is  vividly  exemplified  in  the 
case  of  Godfrey  and  his  crusaders,  when,  after  the  carnage  at 
Antioch  and  after  having  marked  with  blood  their  course 
through  Syria,  they  arrived  at  last,  on  that  day  in  June  of  the 
year  1099,  within  sight  of  Jerusalem,  and  in  a  moment  their 
souls  were  melted  to  contrition,  and  they  fell  on  their  knees, 
weeping  and  groaning,  and  kissed  the  earth,  and  laid  aside 
their  armor,  and  in  the  raiment  of  pilgrims  walked  barefooted 
toward  the  holy  city ;  then  armed  again,  and  after  a  fearful 
siege  took  the  city,  heaped  the  streets  with  slain,  waded  in 
blood,  —  and  then  donned  white  garments,  went  to  the  church 
of  the  Holy  Sepulchre,  and  bowed  down  in  a  passion  of 
humiliation. 

In  the  excitement  of  battle  as  well  as  in  the  silence  of  mon- 
astic cells  men  saw  visions,  or  transmuted  what  they  saw  into 
wondrous  apparitions.  The  Crusaders  were  nerved  in  their 
assault  upon  the  walls  of  Jerusalem  by  the  figure  of  a  knight 
that  appeared  over  upon  Mount  Olivet,  whom  they  took  to  be 
St.  George  the  Martyr. 

The  incident  of  the  discovery  at  Antioch  of  the  tip  of  the 
lance  said  to  have  pierced  the  Saviour's  side,  and  its  immedi- 
ate effect  in  reviving  the  spirit  of  the  host,  is  a  striking  ex- 
ample of  the  belief  of  those  days  in  a  miraculous  virtue,  a 
mysterious  power  of  communicating  influence,  inhering  in  the 
bones  of  saints  and  martyrs,  or  in  objects  that  had  touched 


• 

ENGLISH  LITERA\UFLE}  '  "  hi 


their  bodies.  But  most  significant  of  all  was  tKe"  discovery  at 
Caesarea,  in  noi,  of  a  bowl  of  greenish  glass,  said  to  be 
emerald,  which  was  fully  believed  to  be  the  dish  out  of  which 
Christ  ate  the  broth  of  bitter  herbs  at  his  last  passover,  and  in 
which  Joseph  of  Arimathea  afterward  caught  the  blood  issuing 
from  his  crucified  body. 

An  important  development  of  the  Crusade  and  of  the  age 
was  the  order  of  the  Knights  Templars.  In  those  military 
monks  we  see  the  perfect  blend  of  the  two  passions  of  the  age, 
worship  and  warfare.  Within  twenty  years  after  the  founding 
of  the  Latin  Kingdom  of  Jerusalem,  a  few  knights  banded 
themselves  together  to  protect  pilgrims  on  their  way  to  the 
holy  places  ;  they  obtained  from  Baldwin  II  the  right  to  lodge 
in  the  precincts  of  his  palace,  on  the  site  of  Solomon's  temple, 
—  thence  their  title  was  derived.  They  chose  as  their  habit 
a  white  mantle  marked  with  the  red  cross  of  the  Crusaders. 
As  members  of  a  religious  order  they  were  bound  to  attend  the 
daily  services  of  the  church  ;  and  at  their  meals  no  voice  was 
heard  save  that  of  the  reader  of  the  Bible-lesson  for  the  day. 
Upon  entering  the  order,  in  sign  of  utter  self-renunciation,  the 
knight  gave  up  all  his  private  property,  pledged  himself  to 
chastity,  and  to  kiss  no  woman,  not  even  his  nearest  relative, 
and  vowed  unquestioning  obedience  to  the  master,  whose 
bidding  should  be  to  him  as  God's.  Two  forms  of  disobedi- 
ence, which  were  yet  one,  were  punishable  by  expulsion  from 
the  society  :  one  was  desertion  to  the  infidels,  the  other,  dis- 
loyalty to  the  faith,  that  is,  heresy,  —  and  both  were  treason. 
A  few  years  after  the  institution  of  the  order  Bernard  was 
chosen  as  its  patron,  and  after  that  it  gained  great  and  speedy 
prestige  ;  before  the  Second  Crusade,  of  which  their  patron 
and  they  were  the  chief  promoters,  the  knights  had  established 
themselves  in  Italy,  France,  Spain,  Germany,  and  England. 

In  England  the  twofold  interest  of  the  age  was  illustrated 
by  massive  monuments  that  still  endure  —  the  castles  and 


18  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

cathedrals  that  the  Normans  raised.  Gundulph,  military 
architect  and  engineer  of  William  the  Conqueror,  was  also 
bishop  of  Rochester ;  he  re-built  his  cathedral,  and  reared  near 
by  it  the  castle  whose  mighty  keep  still  frowns  upon  the 
Medway.  Bishops  were  famous  castle-builders'  in  those  days  : 
King  Stephen  got  into  trouble  by  attempting  to  destroy  some 
of  their  fortresses.  All  over  the  land,  on  commanding  sites, 
rose  the  threatening  walls,  the  massive  keeps  with  machicolated 
battlements  of  the  castles  of  the  Norman  lords,  temporal  and 
spiritual.  Meanwhile,  the  splendid  fanes  of  Winchester,  Dur- 
ham, Norwich,  Peterborough,  Ely,  and  Gloucester  were  also 
rising,  and  in  its  lovely  vale  the  stately  nave  pf  Fountains 
Abbey,  over  whose  ponderous  pillars  the  pointed  arches  —  the 
first  to  be  seen  in  England  —  gave  evidence,  possibly,  of  the 
influence  of  Saracenic  art. 

Such  was  the  world  into  which  Geoffrey  of  Monmouth  was 
born,  and  before  which  he  held  up  the  figure  of  the  legendary 
Arthur  as  the  mirror  of  chivalry.  Geoffrey  came,  like  his  hero, 
from  the  west  of  Britain ;  he  was  the  son  of  a  priest  named 
Arthur,  of  the  household  of  Robert,  Earl  of  Gloucester,  natural 
son  of  King  Henry  I.  He  studied  at  Oxford,  and  became  a 
man  of  learning  according  to  the  pattern  of  the  age.  There 
he  gathered  material  for  his  history ;  there,  at  a  churchman's 
bidding,  he  rendered  into  Latin  the  "  Prophecies  of  Merlin." 
About  the  year  1140  he  was  appointed  archdeacon  of  Llandaff, 
through  the  influence  of  his  father's  brother,  who  was  bishop 
there.  Meantime  he  was  slowly  shaping  his  Latin  "  History 
of  the  Kings  of  Britain,"  making  use,  probably,  of  some  old 
collection  of  legends  long  since  lost.  The  work  assumed  its 
final  form,  it  is  believed,  in  1147 — the  year  of  the  Second 
Crusade.  In  1151,  Geoffrey  was  promoted  to  the  bishopric  of 
St.  Asaph ;  he  died  at  Llandaff  in  1154. 

During  his  lifetime  and  for  half  a  century  after  there  was 
extraordinary  literary  activity  among  the  Welsh.  Beside  his 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  19 

friend,  the  chronicler  Carodoc,  there  appeared  a  veritable 
galaxy  of  bards.  Through  Geoffrey  part  of  this  energy  was 
projected  into  the  general  literature  of  the  world. 

In  his  work  appeared  a  troop  of  figures  that  were  destined 
to  a  literary  immortality.  Herein  is  manifest  the  difference 
between  a  vein  of  Anglo-Norman  writing  and  the  whole  body 
of  Anglo-Saxon  literature :  the  latter  contributed  not  one  great 
theme  to  English  literature,  while  the  stories  of  British  kings 
that  Geoffrey  told,  the  error  of  Lear,  the  conquests  and  mag- 
nificence of  Arthur,  and  his  mysterious  end,  have  exercised 
over  it  a  sovereign  charm.  It  is  interesting  to  notice  that,  just 
at  the  time  when  the  Norman  Conquest  had  drawn  England 
into  the  current  of  European  history,  Geoffrey  coordinated  the 
legendary  history  of  the  island  with  that  of  ancient  Rome  : 
both  were  made  to  spring  from  the  same  Trojan  stock.  His 
book  played  an  important  part  in  the  literary  awakening  of 
mediaeval  Europe ;  its  influence  upon  the  continent  was  as 
great  as  it  was  in  England.  It  was  soon  translated  into 
French  verse  by  Robert  Wace,  a  Norman  trouvere,  under 
the  title  of  "  Brut,"  or  Brutus  —  the  grandson  of  ^Eneas,  fabled 
to  have  become  the  first  of  the  British  kings. 

During  the  life-time  of  Geoffrey  another  literary  tradition, 
deeply  religious  in  its  nature,  was  taking  shape,  which  was 
destined  shortly  to  be  grafted  upon  his  and  to  transform  it. 

Among  the  chroniclers  of  the  twelfth  and  thirteenth  cen- 
turies who  compiled  in  Latin  their  Histories  of  England,  — 
men  who  were  scandalized  by  Geoffrey's  presumption  in  calling 
his  fictions  a  history,  —  William  of  Malmesbury  only  is  con- 
nected with  our  subject  through  his  Latin  treatise  "  On  the 
Antiquity  of  the  Church  of  Glastonbury."  He  is  believed  to 
have  been  the  son  of  a  Norman  father  and  a  Saxon  mother ; 
he  certainly  exemplified  in  his  person  that  union  of  conquerors 
and  conquered  which  was  in  process  earlier  than  is  commonly 
supposed,  —  an  historic  illustration  of  it  is  the  marriage*  of 


20  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

Henry  I  to  Matilda,  daughter  of  Queen  Margaret  of  Scotland 
—  a  princess  of  the  Saxon  line.  William  entered  the  Benedic- 
tine monastery  at  Malmesbury,  and  after  a  time  was  made 
custodian  of  its  manuscripts.  He  was  befriended  by  Geoffrey's 
patron,  the  earl  Robert  of  Gloucester.  His  history  of  England 
ends  with  the  year  1142,  and  probably  indicates  the  time  of  his 
death.  His  treatise  above  referred  to  tells  of  the  wandering 
of  Joseph  of  Arimathea  and  his  companions  to  Glastonbury, 
where  they  preached  to  the  natives,  and  gathered  the  first 
Christian  church  in  Britain.  It  is  worth  noting  that  in  the 
legend  Joseph  and  his  fellow-missionaries  make  up  the  mystic 
number  twelve. 

Now  the  romantic  interest  of  the  story  of  Joseph  centred  in 
the  dish  that  he  had  brought  with  him,  which  had  been  used  at 
the  Last  Supper,  and  which  held  the  blood  that  issued  from 
the  five  wounds  of  the  Lord.  Moreover,  his  body  and  King 
Arthur's  both  lay  enshrined,  according  to  fable,  in  the  sacred 
precincts  at  Glastonbury.  When  we  consider  this  and  bear  in 
mind  the  general  character  of  the  age,  we  see  clearly  how  just 
one  touch  of  poetic  imagination  might  fuse  the  two  lines  of 
romance  in  one,  illumining  the  secular  with  the  sacred,  chang- 
ing tales  of  bloodshed,  passion,  and  demonic  arts  into  descrip- 
tions of  the  search  for  ideal  purity  and  holiness,  as  suddenly 
and  wonderfully  as  the  mood  of  the  Crusaders  was  changed 
when  they  came  within  sight  of  the  walls  of  Jerusalem.  It  was 
apparently  by  a  churchman  named  Walter  Map,  or  Mapes,  that 
that  final  touch  was  given. 

He  was  born,  probably,  in  the  west  of  England.  He  attended 
lectures  at  the  University  of  Paris,  and  after  his  return  to  Eng- 
land was  made  a  canon  of  Salisbury  —  in  the  Arthurian  region. 
His  talents  gained  him  the  favorable  notice  of  King  Henry  II ; 
he  was  employed  at  court,  and  accompanied  the  king  upon  his 
progresses  through  the  realm.  In  1173,  he  visited  Gloucester 
as  itinerant  justice  of  the  district.  The  same  year,  Thomas 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  21 

a  Becket,  archbishop  of  Canterbury,  who  had  been  slain  three 
years  before,  was  canonized  by  Pope  Alexander  III. 

It  must  have  been  about  this  time  that  Walter  wrote,  in 
Norman-French,  his  prose  romance  of  the  Quest  of  the  Holy 
Grail.  We  cannot  but  feel  some  connection  between  that  work 
and  the  great  events  of  those  years,  —  the  barbarous  murder  of 
the  archbishop,  who  murmured  with  his  last  breath,  that  in 
defence  of  the  church  he  was  willing  to  die,  —  the  disasters  that 
soon  after  ensued,  and  almost  overwhelmed  the  king,  —  the 
canonization,  —  the  painful  humiliation  of  Henry  before  the 
shrine  of  the  martyr  at  Canterbury,  —  these  events  produced 
that  excitation  of  imagination  that  precedes  a  great  conception, 
that  atmosphere  of  horror  and  fearful  expectancy,  of  wonder 
and  religious  awe,  upon  which  flashed  in  blinding  light  the 
apparition  of  the  Holy  Grail. 

Walter  also  wrote,  in  part  at  least,  the  romance  of  Lancelot 
du  Lac.  He  was  present,  as  an  English  delegate,  at  a  council 
held  by  Pope  Alexander  III,  —  probably  that  of  the  Lateran 
in  the  year  1179.  In  1196,  he  was  appointed  archdeacon  of 
Oxford.  He  was  still  living  in  the  reign  of  King  John.  With 
his  Latin  works  we  are  not  concerned  here. 

A  significant  fact  in  connection  with  the  Quest  of  the  Grail 
is  that  in  the  twelfth  century  the  sacramental  wine  began  to  be 
generally  withheld  from  the  laity.  Parallel  with  this  change 
came  a  change  in  the  thought  of  the  Grail :  from  the  dish  it 
became  the  cup  used  by  Jesus  at  the  institution  of  his  supper, 
—  that  is,  the  chalice,  —  a  symbol  of  the  central  mystery  of  the 
Christian  faith.  The  thrill  that  accompanied  its  appearance  is 
like  the  touch  of  a  ghostly  presence.  And  so  the  vision  of  the 
Grail  became  the  ideal  of  the  Middle  Ages  ;  it  was  a  glimpse 
of  heaven,  God's  presence  with  men  ;  it  was  purity  and  holi- 
ness and  perfect  faith  and  peace.  And  only  like  could  com- 
prehend like.  Indescribably  beautiful  and  pathetic  is  Arthur's 
grief  when  his  knights,  with  one  accord,  vow  to  undertake  the 


22  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

quest :  he  knows  that  the  charm  of  the  Round  Table  is  over- 
come by  a  more  potent  spell ;  that  its  glory  is  departing  for- 
ever ;  that  his  company  of  gallant  knights  will  gather  round 
him  no  more.  It  is  the  sundering  of  human  ties  by  the  con- 
straining power  of  a  great  ideal. 

Like  Geoffrey's  romance  of  Arthur,  the  legend  of  the  Grail 
soon  won  wide  popularity  upon  the  continent ;  it  stimulated 
the  imagination  of  the  age,  deeply  impressed  its  finest  poets, 
and  was  the  motive  of  its  most  spiritual  poetry.  At  the  French 
court  Robert  de  Boron  produced  his  prose  version  of  the  story 
of  Joseph  of  Arimathea,  and  Chrestien  de  Troyes,  a  prolific 
versifier,  who  flourished  in  the  years  1180-1190,  made  the 
Grail  the  motive  of  his  romance  of  "  Percevale."  A  profoundly 
imaginative  version  of  this  work  was  the  "  Parzival "  of  the 
German  knight,  Wolfram  von  Eschenbach. 

In  lighter  vein,  with  frequent  touches  of  satire,  Wolfram's 
contemporary  and  rival,  Godfrey  of  Strassburg,  recounted  the 
history  of  the  fateful  passion  of  Tristram  and  Isolde  —  a  theme 
that  hardly  yielded  to  the  legend  of  Arthur  in  popular  interest. 

At  this  period  the  great  popular  epic  of  Germany,  the 
Nibelungenlied,  took  its  final  form  —  a  form  interesting  to 
compare  and  contrast  with  that  of  Beowulf,  —  a  savage, 
heathen  core  with  a  faint  burnish  of  Christian  or  rather 
ecclesiastical  terms.  And  as  Denmark  was  drawn  in  the 
twelfth  century  into  the  political  system  of  the  Empire,  so 
do  her  ancient  ballads  seem  to  circle,  like  satellites,  in  orbits 
more  or  less  remote,  round  the  great  luminary,  the  Lay  of  the 
Nibelungen.  In  France,  the  "  Chansons  de  Gestes,"  a  mass 
of  verse  dealing  with  Charlemagne  and  his  paladins,  deeply 
imbued  with  the  feudal  spirit,  had  already  been  produced. 
This,  too,  was  the  era  of  the  troubadours,  chief  among  whom 
were  Geoffrey  Rudel,  Bertrand  de  Born,  and  Pierre  Vidal ;  it 
was  indeed  the  golden  prime  of  that  Provencal  poetry  of  love 
and  war,  so  soon  to  be  extinguished  by  the  ferocious  crusade 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  23 

that  desolated  Languedoc,  and  by  the  Inquisition  thereupon 
established.  In  Spain,  the  first  and  greatest  monument  of  the 
young  Spanish  language,  the  grand  poem  of  the  Cid,  champion 
of  the  faith  and  of  the  nation,  emerged  at  this  time  amid  the 
tumult  of  the  Holy  Wars  that  were  going  on  in  that  peninsula. 
The  history  of  Spain,  partly  by  reason  of  its  very  aloofness 
from  the  common  interests  of  the  rest  of  Europe,  presents  the 
more  striking  analogies  to  them,  chief  among  these  being  the 
religious  orders  of  knighthood  that  emulated  the  glory  of  the 
Templars  and  the  Knights  of  St.  John.  The  order  of  Cala- 
trava  originated  in  an  heroic  defence  of  that  place  against  the 
Moors  in  the  year  1158  ;  and  the  Knights  of  Santiago,  who  for 
many  years  had  protected  pilgrims  to  the  famous  shrine  of 
Compostella,  were  formally  instituted  in  1175  by  a  bull  of 
Alexander  III. 

It  is  believed  that  the  epic  of  the  Cid  as  we  have  it  was 
shaped  from  an  earlier  collection  of  ballads  that  sprang  from 
the  fierce  border  warfare  of  Moors  and  Spaniards  by  an  eccle- 
siastic who  '  refined,  idealized,  and  Christianized  the  whole. 
This  gentle  graft  upon  a  savage  stock  would  then  present  an 
interesting  parallel  to  the  introduction  of  the  Grail-motive  into 
Arthurian  romance.  And  now,  at  the  close  of  the  chapter,  we 
return  to  England,  to  take  note  of  the  poet  Layamon,  in  whose 
work  the  course  of  English  literature,  properly  speaking,  begins. 

It  may  seem  that  we  have  travelled  far  and  wide  before 
making  a  beginning,  —  but  it  will  prove  to  have  been  well 
worth  our  while  to  do  so.  We  have  gained  a  general  impres- 
sion of  the  character  of  the  age  ;  have  traced  the  working  out 
of  a  great  conception ;  and  have  seen  how  widespread  and 
productive  was  the  fresh  literary  enthusiasm  of  the  twelfth 
century.  Now  our  footing  is  firm ;  we  have  secured  a  point  of 
departure  for  the  literary  developments  that  are  to  come. 

The  latter  half  of  the  twelfth  century,  though  remarkably 
barren  of  English  writings,  was,  for  that  very  reason  largely, 


24  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

the  seed-time  of  English  speech.  Freed  from  the  restraining 
influence  that  works  of  genius  exert  upon  the  tendency  to 
linguistic  change,  unused  in  the  services  of  the  church,  in  the 
homes  of  the  learned  and  the  great,  the  language  of  the  people 
passed  through  a  period  of  confusion  from  which  it  emerged  as 
archaic  English.  The  changes  it  underwent  were  chiefly  of 
two  kinds,  inflexional  and  lexical :  first,  a  general  reduction  of 
the  various  Anglo-Saxon  endings  for  case,  gender,  number, 
person,  mood,  to  e  or  en  on  its  way  to  e ;  and  second,  the  intro- 
duction of  new  words  from  Norman-French.  Both  modes  of 
development  are  exemplified  in  Layamon's  poem,  although, 
long  as  it  is  —  it  contains  over  thirty-two  thousand  lines  — 
there  are  hardly  one  hundred  and  seventy  words  of  French 
derivation  to  be  found  in  it. 

Layamon  was  a  priest  who  lived  on  the  banks  of  the  Severn, 
in  Worcestershire.  His  alliterative  poem  —  in  which  now  and 
then  a  stammer  of  rhyme  is  heard  —  belongs  to  the  threshold 
of  the  thirteenth  century,  and  stands  at  the  head  of  English 
literature :  its  author  has  been  called  the  English  Ennius.  A 
qualification  is  necessary,  however;  Layamon  wrote  in  a  dia- 
lect, in  the  speech  of  the  south  of  England  —  one  of  the  three 
dialects  among  which  English  writings  are  to  be  divided  for  the 
next  hundred  and  fifty  years.  His  language  is  difficult,  no 
doubt ;  special  preparation  is  required  to  understand  it,  and  a 
glossary  must  be  constantly  consulted;  but  it  is  not  like  learn- 
ing a  foreign  tongue,  —  two  or  three  hours  of  study  a  day  for 
three  or  four  days  would  make  one  master  of  the  grammatical 
difficulties  that  stand  in  the  way  of  one's  enjoyment  of  the 
poem. 

It  is  called  the  "  Brut,"  and  is  a  translation,  with  many 
additions,  of  the  Brut  of  Robert  Wace.  It  is  the  first  account 
in  English  of  those  mythical  British  kings  that  were  to  play  so 
great  a  part  in  English  literature.  Here  we  have  the  story  of 
Lear  (who,  as  romance  says,  gave  his  name  to  Leicester),  as 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  25 

Geoffrey  of  Monmouth  told  it :  the  injured  king  visits  his 
daughter  "  Cordoille  "  in  France,  and  obtains  from  the  king 
her  husband  a  force  sufficient  to  re-conquer  England,  over 
which  he  reigns  gloriously  until  his  peaceful  death,  three  years 
after.  Following  this  comes  the  story  of  "  Fereus  and  Poreus," 
and  shortly  after  of  "  Kinbelin,"  in  whose  time  Christ  was  born, 
—  who,  in  the  theology  of  our  poet,  is  "Father  in  heaven, 
Son  on  earth  of  the  good  maiden,  and  holds  with  himself  the 
Holy  Ghost."  Soon  there  ensues  the  voluminous  account  of 
the  deeds  of  Arthur,  who  became  king  at  the  age  of  fifteen 
years ;  he  was  prosperous,  rich  in  gold,  liberal,  strong,  stern  to 
wrong-doers,  dear  to  those  who  did  well, — the  noblest  of 
kings,  the  Britons'  darling.  The  most  interesting  portion  of 
the  vast  work,  and  that  which  best  repays  reading,  is  the  de- 
scription of  Arthur's  coronation,  which  extends  for  about  five 
hundred  lines  onward  from  line  twenty-four-thousand  two- 
hundred  and  forty-one.  Here  are  reflected  the  brilliant  dis- 
play of  regal  power,  the  stately  ceremonial,  and  all  the  external 
magnificence  of  the  poet's  own  age  —  the  age  of  Richard  I  and 
the  Third  Crusade.  The  coronation  takes  place  on  Whit- 
sunday at  the  British  capital,  Kaerlion-on-Usk,  —  a  wealthy 
and  splendid  city,  second  only  to  Rome  in  the  whole  world. 
Thither  have  gathered  from  every  quarter  Arthur's  vassal 
kings,  earls,  and  thanes,  and  ladies  in  gay  array.  Dubricius, 
archbishop  of  Kaerlion,  and  the  archbishops  of  London  and 
York,  take  part  in  the  solemn  ceremony  ;  Dubricius,  the  chosen 
of  Christ,  the  Pope's  legate,  leads  the  procession,  and  places 
the  crown  upon  Arthur's  head.  Then  follow  the  coronation 
feast,  and  the  games,  all  through  the  long  summer  afternoon, 
upon  the  meadows  about  Kaerlion. 

Thus  sweetly,  with  the  glamour  of  poetry,  did  the  Britons 
and  their  king  take  captive  the  descendants  of  their  Saxon 
conquerors,  as  they  had  already,  through  Geoffrey's  Latin 
romance,  enthralled  their  conquerors'  conquerors.  Thus,  too, 


26  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

by  the  memory  of  Saint  Dubricius,  was  the  fame  of  the  ancient 
British  church  restored.  The  harmonizing  effect  of  these  old 
legends  upon  the  mixed  population  of  England  must  have  been 
great  indeed. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  27 


II. 

REMARKABLE  differences  appear  between  the  work  of  Laya- 
mon  and  the  writings  of  the  age  that  succeeded  his,  —  differ- 
ences that  were  rooted,  of  course,  in  the  altered  character  of 
the  time.  Certain  notable  events  help  us  to  determine  the 
bounds  of  the  new  period:  it  extended  from  the  year  1204, 
when  Normandy  was  lost  to  the  English  crown,  to  1265,  —  the 
year  of  the  first  typical  English  parliament,  the  battle  of  Eves- 
ham,  and,  let  us  add,  of  the  birth  of  Dante  Alighieri.  It  is 
hardly  necessary  to  say  that  the  formative  influences  of  the 
period  were  at  work  years  before  the  former  date  (they  are  dis- 
tinguishable upon  the  continent  at  least  as  early  as  1170),  and 
though  waning  were  yet  operative  years  after  the  latter. 

A  conspicuous  sign  of  the  time  was  the  decay  of  crusading 
zeal.  Early  in  the  thirteenth  century  the  name  crusade  was 
prostituted  by  being  applied  to  shameless  attacks  upon  Chris- 
tians. A  great  expedition  designed  for  the  recovery  of  trie 
Holy  Sepulchre  was  diverted,  by  the  pride  and  greed  of  the 
Venetians,  into  a  siege  and  capture  of  the  city  of  Zara,  and 
soon  after  of  Constantinople,  and  resulted  in  the  temporary 
subversion  of  the  hollow  Empire  of  the  East.  The  ruthless 
"  crusade "  against  the  Albigenses,  which  for  twenty  years 
desolated  the  fairest  provinces  of  France,  was  another  instance 
of  abuse  of  the  name  for  purposes  of  mischief.  The  crusade 
of  Andrew  of  Hungary  in  Palestine,  in  1217,  ended  in  failure 
and  speedy  retreat.  Europe  and  Asia  alike  were  growing 
weary  of  the  long  and  costly  struggle ;  the  only  considerable 
successes  of  the  time  were  the  bloodless  victories  of  the 
Emperor  Frederick  II,  in  1229,  and  Richard,  Earl  of  Corn- 
wall, in  1240,  who,  by  negotiation  with  the  infidels,  obtained 


28  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

possession  of  Jerusalem  and  neighboring  towns.  The  zeal  of 
the  former  age  burned  brightly  in  the  breast  of  Louis  IX  alone, 
and  never  with  a  purer  flame;  but  his  first  expedition  was 
disastrous  in  the  extreme,  and  he  died,  in  the  year  1270,  upon 
the  torrid  sands  of  Tunis  ere  the  second  had  fairly  begun. 
That  was  the  last  of  the  crusades.  The  forces  of  the  Saracens 
drew  round  the  doomed  town  of  Acre,  the  last  stronghold  of  the 
Christians  in  Palestine ;  but  the  crash  of  its  walls  awoke  not 
an  echo  in  Europe,  and  the  reddened  waves  washed  the 
corpses  of  its  defenders  along  the  coast. 

At  the  other  extremity  of  the  Mediterranean,  Ferdinand  III, 
the  sainted  King  of  Spain,  was  achieving  great  success  in  his 
struggle  with  the  Moslem  power ;  he  took  town  after  town  in 
Andalusia,  and  in  1236  had  the  pleasure  of  converting  the 
many-pillared  mosque  of  Cordova  into  a  cathedral.  In  1249 
he  took  Seville,  the  largest  city  in  the  peninsula,  after  a  pro- 
tracted siege  ;  and  at  last  all  that  remained  to  the  Moors  was 
their  province  of  Granada,  enclosed,  like  a  promontory,  by  the 
Christian  power.  But  the  absorbing  interest  of  the  age  was 
the  deadly  strife  between  the  papacy  and  the  house  of  Hohen- 
staufen,  which  ended  in  the  extermination  of  the  latter  in  the 
year  1268,  when  the  boy  Conradin,  grandson  of  Frederick  II, 
and  last  of  his  line,  went  to  a  cruel  death  upon  the  scaffold  in 
a  public  square  at  Naples.  Grievous  as  the  conflict  was,  it 
yet  shows  that  the  mind  of  Europe  had  become  more  deeply 
engaged  in  its  own  concerns  than  in  the  support  of  a  shadowy 
kingdom  far  off  upon  the  Asiatic  shore.  It  is  this  introversion 
of  the  mind  that  gives  tone  to  the  whole  period. 

The  most  remarkable  religious  phenomenon  of  the  thirteenth 
century,  —  and  in  religious  movements  the  philosophy  of  all 
these  ages  practically  consists,  —  was  the  foundation  of  the 
great  mendicant  orders.  Their  originating  principle  was  that 
longing  for  complete  disengagement  from  the  world  that  was 
manifested  with  fresh  force  by  Francis  of  Assisi,  who  pro- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  29 

posed  a  self-renunciation  so  absolute  that  it  seemed  fanatical 
and  impracticable  even  to  the  churchmen  of  those  days.  We 
cannot  but  honor  the  motive  that  underlay  the  practice  of  such 
excessive  poverty ;  it  was  designed  to  disencumber  the  brothers 
of  all  burdens  so  that  they  might  move  around  freely  among 
the  growing  towns,  preaching  the  word  of  God.  A  similar  zeal 
for  preaching  joined  with  a  similar  poverty  had  already  been 
manifested  by  the  Waldenses,  whose  apostolical  missionaries 
had  penetrated,  in  the  time  of  St.  Francis,  into  all  the  great 
countries  of  Western  Europe,  having  even  crossed  over  into 
England.  We  must  recognize  this  movement  as  the  evan- 
gelical phase  of  mediaeval  piety. 

Francis'  attitude  respecting  this  world's  goods  was  deter- 
mined by  a  thorough-going  change  in  his  character.  Between 
the  lines  of  his  life  we  may  read  something  of  the  pain  that 
attends  every  transition  from  one  age  of  the  spirit  to  another, 
the  misunderstanding  of  the  new  by  the  old,  the  condemnation 
of  the  old  by  the  new,  the  mental  distress,  the  domestic  agony, 
that  should  teach  us  a  deep  reverence  and  sympathy  for  the 
heroes  of  every  spiritual  renascence.  Francis  practised  strange 
austerities  to  bring  and  keep  his  body  in  subjection;  with  that 
quaint  humor  that  helped  to  win  him  others'  hearts  he  called 
his  body  "  Brother  Ass,"  because  it  was  made  only  to  slave 
and  be  beaten  and  to  be  supported  by  the  coarsest  food.  His 
order  was  recognized  by  Pope  Innocent  III  in  1210,  and  from 
that  time  to  his  death  Francis  held  the  primacy  of  piety  in 
Christendom.  In  1219,  it  was  estimated  that  five  thousand 
friars  attended  the  general  chapter  of  the  order.  The  virgin 
Clara,  also  of  Assisi,  founded  an  order  for  women  under 
Francis'  rule,  which  soon  numbered  twelve  houses  in  Italy, 
with  others  in  Germany.  A  little  later,  the  princess  Isabel, 
sister  of  St.  Louis,  became  the  patroness  of  the  Clares  in 
France.  Clara  was  as  deeply  enamoured  of  poverty  and 
ascetic  practices  as  was  her  model :  she  went  barefoot ;  wore  a 


30  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

shift  woven  with  sharp  bristles ;  lived  on  bread  and  water,  and 
slept  upon  the  bare  floor.  We  are  not  surprised  to  hear  that 
she  suffered  much  from  sickness,  —  yet  even  her  ill  turns  she 
improved  by  spinning  fine  linen  thread  to  be  woven  into  altar- 
cloths  and  corporals  for  the  churches  of  Assisi. 

After  the  death  of  Francis,  in  1226,  his  work  was  carried  on 
in  the  same  spirit  by  Anthony  of  Padua  (born  in  Lisbon,  in 
1 195).  He  was  the  most  noted  preacher  of  his  age,  and  un- 
dertook long  missionary  tours  in  France,  Spain,  and  Italy. 
Within  a  few  years  the  Franciscan  order  produced  its  brightest 
light,  the  saint  and  doctor  Bonaventura,  who  was  five  years  of 
age  at  the  time  of  the  founder's  death,  took  the  habit  at  the 
age  of  twenty-two  and  became  erelong  general  of  the  order. 
Among  his  voluminous  works  is  one  that  he  wrote  at  Francis' 
retreat  upon  Mt.  Alverno  :  the  little  golden  treatise  of  mediae- 
val mysticism,  —  the  "  Itinerarium  Mentis  in  Deum." 

At  the  same  time  the  rival  mendicant  order,  the  Dominican, 
brought  forth  its  great  saint  and  doctor,  Thomas  Aquinas, 
whose  "  Summa,"  or  system  of  theology,  is  a  monument  of  in- 
dustry and  exhaustive  analysis.  Aquinas  drew  a  strict  line  of 
demarcation  between  the  provinces  of  faith  and  reason  in 
matters  of  religion,  —  a  psychological  distinction  fertile  of 
future  controversy  and  speculation. 

The  three  other  mendicant  fraternities,  Carmelite,  Augus- 
tinian,  and  Servite,  never  attained  the  popularity  and  power  of 
the  former  two.  The  Servites  originated  in  Florence,  about 
the  year  1233.  The  devout  Filippo  Benizi  was  one  of  the 
founders,  and  in  time  became  general  of  the  order.  He  was 
an  earnest  preacher,  and  once  undertook  an  extensive  mission- 
ary journey  through  France  and  Flanders.  The  glory  of  the 
Augustinians  in  this  age  was  Nicholas  of  Tolentino,  in  the 
march  of  Ancona.  He  too  was  a  fervent  and  persuasive 
preacher,  but  his  usefulness  was  impaired  by  his  ascetic  rigors, 
which  brought  upon  him  many  painful  infirmities,  which  he 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  31 

mistook  as  punishments  for  his  laxity.  He  chastised  his  re- 
bellious flesh  by  binding  it  about  with  heavy  iron  girdles;  he 
ate  only  the  simplest  and  coarsest  food  ;  his  bed  was  a  board, 
his  pillow  a  stone. 

The  little  that  we  have  said  of  the  monks  and  friars  is  the 
very  least  that  was  due  to  men  who  contributed  a  large  part  of 
the  literature  of  mediaeval  Europe,  and  copied  and  preserved 
the  rest  in  their  libraries. 

An  interesting  episode  of  the  time  was  the  military  mission- 
work  of  the  Teutonic  Knights.  As  the  crusading  fever  abated, 
they  devoted  their  attention  more  and  more  to  their  boreal 
provinces  about  the  Baltic  Sea.  Having  converted  the  natives 
to  Christianity  at  the  point  of  the  sword,  and  having  established 
some  scattered  bishoprics  in  Esthonia,  Livonia,  and  Courland, 
they  caused  the  whole  region  to  be  erected  into  an  ecclesi- 
astical province,  with  its  archiepiscopal  see  at  Riga,  in  the 
year  1255. 

As  it  was  throughout  Europe  in  general,  so  was  it  in  England 
in  particular:  interest  in  home  affairs  and  a  spirit  of  religious 
reflection  superseded  the  interest  of  the  preceding  age  in  things 
without  and  far  away.  The  conquest  of  Normandy  by  Philip 
of  France  served  greatly  to  stimulate,  even  if  it  did  not  create, 
this  new  self-consciousness  of  the  English  people.  That  event 
was  followed  by  two  generations  of  internecine  strife,  the  most 
confused  period  of  English  history,  yet  fruitful  of  future  good 
beyond  almost  any  other.  It  was  a  protracted  struggle  be- 
tween a  monarchy  that  aimed  to  be  absolute,  that  carried 
beyond  endurance  its  abuse  of  power,  that  rested  upon  ex- 
ternal sanction  and  support,  and  a  nobility  that  however  turbu- 
lent was  yet  determined  to  be  free ;  between  sovereigns  like 
John  and  his  son  Henry  III  on  the  one  hand,  the  first  tyran- 
nical, cowardly,  and  evil,  the  other  capricious  and  weak,  who, 
to  gain  the  support  of  the  Roman  curia  against  their  own 
vassals,  and  to  wring  from  them  the  sums  of  money  of  which 


32  ,      OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

they  stood  in  perpetual  need,  were  willing  to  sell  the  liberties 
of  the  English  church,  and  on  the  other  hand,  a  series  of  able 
and  independent  ecclesiastics,  like  Langton,  Edmund  of  Can- 
terbury, and  Robert  Grosseteste,  who  resented  the  intrusion  of 
Italian  prelates  into  English  livings  and  the  exactions  of  the 
popes,  together  with  the  great  barons,  led  by  the  Marshalls  and 
Simon  de  Montfort,  who  resented  the  insolence  of  royal  favor- 
ites, the  heaping  of  favors  upon  foreigners,  and  all  the  injuries 
of  irresponsible,  personal  government  by  the  king.  It  is 
evident,  moreover,  that  this  opposition  to  royal  incapacity 
and  oppression  which  was  in  truth  the  national  party,  in  spite 
of  the  selfish  motives  that  may  have  swayed  many  of  its 
adherents,  was  buoyed  up  by  the  sympathy  of  the  people,  and 
the  rising  influence  of  the  towns.  It  was  a  dark  and  troublous 
age,  yet  in  it  were  planted  upon  imperishable  foundations  the 
rights  of  persons,  the  liberties  of  Englishmen.  The  charter 
drawn  up  by  barons  and  churchmen  at  Runnymede,  and  signed 
by  King  John  in  June,  1215,  was  confirmed  over  and  over 
again  in  the  following  reign  ;  and  Henry's  bad  faith  and 
neglect  of  its  provisions  led  at  last  to  the  events  of  the  year 
1258,  when  a  wearied  nation  decided  that  he  was  unfit  to  rule. 
Matthew  Paris,  the  best  of  England's  mediaeval  chroniclers, 
through  whose  monkish  Latin  can  be  clearly  discerned  a  kind- 
ling national  consciousness,  is  our  authority  for  a  great  part  of 
the  reign  of  Henry  III,  and  exhibits  in  the  plainest  way  the 
dependence  of  English  upon  papal  politics ;  the  supreme  im- 
portance of  the  contest  between  empire  and  papacy,  and  the 
distress  it  caused  all  thoughtful  minds ;  the  plunder  of  the 
English  and  their  church  to  which  the  pope's  necessities  drove 
him,  and  the  king's  connivance  at  it  for  his  own  selfish  ends. 
The  chronicler  shows,  too,  with  startling  distinctness,  how  that 
awful  contest  palsied  all  crusading  effort,  partly  by  withholding 
aid  from  Europe,  partly  by  stirring  up  strife  between  Hospital- 
lers and  Templars  in  Palestine.  And  further,  by  an  occasional 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  33 

naive  remark  he  discloses  the  ill-feeling  that  existed  among 
members  of  the  long-established  monastic  orders  toward  their 
young,  active,  and  popular  rivals,  the  friars. 

In  the  midst  of  these  manifold  antagonisms,  and  offering,  as 
it  were,  a  refuge  from  them,  there  rose  those  chaste  examples 
of  early  Gothic  architecture  in  which  the  deepening  religious 
consciousness  of  the  time  found  expression.  In  France,  the 
cathedrals  of  Chartres,  Rheims,  and  Amiens,  in  Germany, 
those  of  Freiburg  and  Strassburg  were  more  or  less  advanced 
toward  completion,  and  the  reconstruction  of  the  choir  of 
Cologne  was  begun.  A  significant  change  in  the  ground-plan 
of  churches  accompanied  in  England  the  substitution  of  the 
pointed  arch  for  the  round  :  a  square  eastern  end  replaced  the 
Norman  apse.  The  cathedral  of  Lincoln  was  covered  with  a 
substantial  vault,  the  first  probably  that  was  constructed  in  the 
kingdom.  At  Salisbury  was  rising,  between  the  years  1220  and 
1258,  the  most  symmetrical  of  English  cathedrals,  the  only  one 
that  was  completed  according  to  the  original  design  in  the  same 
generation  in  which  it  was  begun.  Westminster  Abbey  was 
rebuilt  by  King  Henry  III  in  the  latter  half  of  his  reign. 

It  is  necessary  to  bear  these  noble  monuments  in  mind  in 
order  to  do  justice  to  an  age  that  is  inadequately  represented 
by  its  literary  remains.  The  truth  is  that  the  spirit  of  poetry 
expressed  itself  mutely  then  in  cathedral  columns,  walls,  win- 
dows, pinnacles,  and  spires,  —  it  had  not  yet  found  a  tongue. 

How  inadequate  as  a  literary  medium  the  English  language 
yet  seemed  to  educated  men  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  the 
patriotic  Grosseteste,  bishop  of  Lincoln,  used  French  in  writing 
his  doctrinal  and  allegorical  poem,  the  "  Chateau  d' Amour " 
(the  "  Castle  "  being  the  body  of  Mary  the  Virgin),  in  which 
he  told  of  Creation,  Redemption,  the  Judgment,  the  pains  of 
Hell  and  the  joys  of  Heaven. 

Now  to  gather  in  a  focus  all  that  has  been  said  of  the  period, 
to  tell  its  secret  in  a  word,  we  must  recur  to  the  thought  of  the 


34  OUTLINE    OF    THE   PHILOSOPHY 

Grail.  That  was  the  supreme  ideal  of  the  preceding  age,  at 
once  its  culmination  and  the  beginning  of  its  dissolution  ;  it 
was  the  pivot  on  which  thought  revolved  into  a  new  stage. 
The  vision  of  the  Grail,  that  is,  a  foretaste  of  heaven,  could 
only  be  attained  by  those  whose  lives  were  spotlessly  pure ; 
and  in  the  thirteenth  century,  chastity  meant  the  extirpation  of 
physical  desire.  For  the  body  was  regarded  as  impure,  and  as 
the  seat  and  source  of  impure  appetites  and  imaginations.  To 
quell  them,  therefore,  its  strength  must  be  reduced ;  to  live  out 
of  the  body,  as  if  one  had  no  body  even,  was  the  ideal  of 
Francis  of  Assisi  and  his  companions.  Hence  the  ascetic 
rigors  already  noted,  hence  the  snapping  of  all  ties  held  to  be 
earthly,  hence  the  straining  to  be  free  from  worldly  pursuits 
and  possessions.  Thus  only,  it  was  thought,  could  one  live  a 
heavenly  life.  Erelong  the  inevitable  consequences  of  such  a 
mode  of  striving  toward  the  ideal  made  themselves  felt ;  the 
flesh,  which  men  abused  and  attempted  to  ignore,  rebelled, 
thrusting  itself  upon  their  notice  ;  then  ensued  a  more  desperate 
struggle  to  overcome  it,  followed  by  more  violent  revenges; 
the  ideal  seemed  ever  more  remote,  and  the  spirit,  groaning 
under  the  bond  it  hated  yet  had  to  endure,  conscious  of  its 
own  weakness,  vexed  by  prurient  suggestions,  torn  by  doubt, 
became  a  prey  to  melancholy.  It  is  in  such  mortal  strife  be- 
tween body  and  soul  that  self-consciousness  grows  clear ;  in 
such  a  time  psychology  begins. 

The  course  of  English  literature  in  this  period  may  be  thus 
summarized  :  devotional  works  appear,  aiming  to  excite  enthusi- 
astic love  for  the  Redeemer  by  pictures  of  his  suffering;  lives 
of  saints  hold  up  examples  for  imitation ;  sermons  instruct, 
exhort,  and  endeavor  to  make  religion  a  more  inward  thing,  a 
matter  of  the  heart ;  soon  an  undertone  of  sadness  begins  to 
be  heard,  a  consciousness  of  failure,  and  marks  of  what  the 
mystics  well  term  "  interior  desolation  " ;  and  this  ends  in  a 
realization  of  the  antithesis  between  soul  and  body  as  a  fierce 
antagonism,  which  induces  final  despair. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  35 

The  first  and  lengthiest  specimen  of  this  group  of  writings 
is  a  series  of  sermons  in  metre  called  the  "  Ormulum  "  by  its 
author,  who  was  an  Augustinian  canon  named  Orm.  He  wrote 
in  the  dialect  of  the  English  midland.  His  plan  was  simple ; 
patience  only  was  needed  for  its  execution,  and  of  that  quality 
Orm  had  good  store.  It  was  to  turn  into  English  the  gospel- 
lesson  for  the  day,  and  then  append  an  exposition  of  it,  —  and 
in  compiling  the  latter  the  author  often  laid  under  contribution 
the  writings  of  the  great  patron  of  his  order.  How  laborious 
he  was  may  be  gauged  by  this,  that  the  fragment  of  his  work 
we  possess,  though  amounting  to  more  than  twenty  thousand 
lines,  only  reaches,  with  many  gaps,  to  the  thirty-second  ser- 
mon, —  and  beyond  that  stretched,  in  endless  perspective, 
scores,  perhaps  hundreds  of  gospel  paraphrases  with  their 
homiletic  commentaries.  That  such  a  work  should  be  com- 
posed or  read  was  owing,  probably,  to  the  fact  that  some 
knowledge  of  the  Scriptures  —  which  were  now  being  withheld 
from  the  laity  —  could  thus  be  imparted  in  a  form  not  subject 
to  censure  by  the  ecclesiastical  authority.  A  council  at  Tou- 
louse, in  the  year  1229,  inhibited  the  use  of  translations  of  the 
Scriptures,  but  left  a  way  open  for  paraphrases  of  portions  of 
them  like  the  work  of  Orm. 

The  Ormulum  flows  on  in  unrhymed  lines  of  eight  and  seven 
syllables  alternately.  Its  iambic  metre  is  exceedingly  regular, 
and  does  certainly  course  onward  with  a  lilt  that  bears  the 
reader  easily  along. 

In  the  Southern  dialect  and  in  prose  were  composed  the 
Lives  of  Saints  Juliana,  Margaret,  and  Katharine  ;  the  "  Ancren 
Riwle,"  or  Rule  of  Anchoresses,  —  giving  in  detail  the  pattern 
according  to  which  nuns  should  frame  their  lives  ;  a  long 
homily  called  "Soul's  Ward  "  (or  "  Guardian  ")  which  urges,  in 
allegorical  fashion,  rejection  of  Self-Will  and  submission  to 
heavenly  Wisdom  as  the  guide  of  life;  and  a  devotional  treatise, 
"  The  Wooing  of  Our  Lord,"  which  in  the  swoon  of  divine  love 


36  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

that  it  labors  to  induce  by  holding  before  the  gaze  the  picture 
of  Jesus'  poverty,  humiliation,  passion,  flagellation,  and  cruci- 
fixion, reminds  one  of  the  ecstasies  of  St.  Francis,  and  of  the 
morbid  desire  of  many  in  that  age  to  produce  in  their  own 
flesh  a  semblance  of  the  five  wounds  of  the  Lord.  Similar 
to  this  in  spirit  is  a  short  poem  called  "A  Good  Orison  of 
Our  Lady,"  —  in  halting  lines  on  the  basis  of  the  iambic 
pentameter,  rhyming  in  couplets,' — in  which  the  beauty  and 
glory  and  power  of  Mary  are  chanted,  and  she  is  entreated 
to  bring  her  worshippers  at  last  to  the  blessed  heaven  where 
she  is. 

To  a  later  date  than  any  of  these  —  about  the  middle  of 
King  Henry's  reign  —  belong  a  quaint  metrical  Bestiary  that 
breaks  into  occasional  rhyme,  and  a  freely  flowing  version  in 
octosyllabic  couplets  of  portions  of  the  books  of  Genesis  and 
Exodus.  Both  are  couched  in  the  Midland  dialect. 

.The  Bestiary  is  a  version  of  a  Latin  work ;  it  is  a  curious 
example  of  that  mixture  of  legend  and  allegory  that  passed  as 
natural  history  in  the  middle  ages.  After  the  description  of  an 
animal  and  its  supposed  habits,  often  apocryphal,  but  accepted 
without  suspicion  on  the  authority  of  the  author,  there  follows 
an  application  to  human  conduct  —  for  every  habit,  imaginary 
or  otherwise,  was  believed  to  be  symbolical,  and  capable  of 
conveying  a  moral  lesson.  As  the  Ant,  for  instance,  gathers 
food  in  season,  so  should  we  gather  spiritual  sustenance  ;  as 
winter  is  to  her  death  is  to  us ;  and  as  she  drops  the  barley 
she  is  carrying  when  she  finds  a  grain  of  fine  wheat,  so  should 
we  discard  the  old  law,  —  the  new  is  better. 

The  representative  piece  of  the  period,  and  best  worth  con- 
ning, is  a  rhyming  homily  of  not  quite  four  hundred  lines  which 
has  been  poorly  entitled  "  A  Moral  Ode."  "  An  Earnest  Call 
to  a  Godly  Life  "  would  be  a  better  description  of  its  character; 
its  burden  is,  "Do  Good  while  yet  there  is  Time."  The 
author's  soul  was  heavily  weighted  with  a  sense  of  the  extent 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  37 

and  power  and  fearful  end  of  sin  ;  he  felt  a  pressing  responsi- 
bility for  the  souls  of  others,  —  he  must  "warny"  all  his  friends 
to  shun  the  path  that  leads  to  endless  pain.  His  voice  comes 
sounding  to  us  out  of  the  very  heart  of  that  sad  age ;  this  is 
proved  by  the  demand  that  there  was  for  the  poem  through 
many  years  :  several  copies  of  it  are  still  extant,  some  dating 
from  the  beginning,  some  from  the  end  of  the  period.  Its  long 
lines,  with  their  monotonous  rise  and  fall,  chime  well  with  the 
solemn  thought  they  convey.  It  begins  with  a  lament  for 
wasted  time  :  the  poet's  youth  is  past,  and  now  he  cannot  do 
the  good  he  then  neglected  to  do  ;  his  example  and  his  regret 
should  incite  his  readers  to  do  well  while  they  can,  else  like 
him  they  will  sorely  repent.  Every  man  must  stand  by  himself, 
trust  no  kinsfolk,  not  even  wife  or  child,  —  and  the  wife  must 
not  trust  her  husband  :  none  but  Christ  can  save  another's 
soul.  Let  each  avail  of  every  opportunity  of  doing  good,  for  a 
time  of  reckoning  is  to  come,  when  every  man  will  be  judged 
by  his  works.  God  is  gracious ;  to  him  a  little  gift  that  comes 
of  good  will  is  dear  :  ah,  do  good  before  it  is  too  late.  At  the 
day  of  doom  devils  will  be  our  accusers;  they  will  bring  to 
light  all  our  evil  deeds,  —  and  we  shall  be  our  own  judges,  for 
there  is  no  witness  like  a  man's  own  heart;  every  man  knows 
himself  best,  his  works  and  his  will,  and  shall  judge  himself  as 
the  testimony  of  his  works  may  compel  him,  either  to  death  or 
to  life.  The  pains  of  hell  are  terrible  and  without  end  ;  a 
week's  pleasure  here  must  be  paid  for  with  seven  years  of 
sorrow  there  ;  if  one  could  experience  that  pain  for  only  one 
hour  now  he  would  abandon  wife  and  child,  father,  sister  and 
brother,  and  all  the  pleasures  and  possessions  of  the  world,  and 
be  ever  in  prayer  that  he  might  escape  hell-fire  and  arrive  at 
last  in  heaven.  Oh  listen  !  —  in  hell  are  hunger  and  thirst, 
heat  and  cold ;  no  rest,  but  ever-burning  fire  for  the  false,  lust- 
ful, and  covetous  ;  adders  and  snakes  to  tear  and  fret  the 
proud  ;  darkness  and  smoke  and  dreadful  fiends,  —  no  tongue 


38  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

can  tell  the  horrors  of  that  place  ;  compared  to  them  the  great- 
est pain  we  suffer  on  earth  is  glee.  And  many  bad  Christians 
are  there,  without  hope,  —  oh,  warn  your  friends  as  I  do  mine. 
We  are  weak  and  sinful  ;  we  suffer  for  our  forefather's  fault ; 
but  God  is  merciful.  Two  words,  love  to  God  and  man,  sum 
up  the  whole  of  God's  law  :  if  we  have  those  two  loves  we 
shall  taste  the  joys  of  heaven.  Reflect  before  it  is  too  late ; 
keep  yourself  from  the  world  and  its  love ;  nine  men  in  every 
ten  are  pressing  down  the  broad  way  ;  few  take  the  narrow 
way  of  God's  commandment,  surrendering  their  own  wills. 
Let  us  take  that  path,  for  it  leads  to  heaven  ;  there  God  is  all 
in  all,  those  who  are  near  him  lack  nothing.  There  shall  those 
see  more  of  him  who  loved  him  more  here,  and  find  in  him  all 
that  man  can  desire :  they  have  enough  that  have  him  who 
possesses  all  things.  May  God  bring  us  to  that  bliss.  Pray, 
dear  friends,  for  the  soul  of  him  who  wrote  this,  that  he  may 
attain  it. 

The  earnest  dualism  of  this  pathetic  exhortation  gives  place 
to  despair  in  a  remarkable  poem  called  "  The  Debate  of  the 
Body  and  the  Soul,"  which  was  widely  popular  in  many  lands 
in  the  thirteenth  century.  Its  grotesqueness  and  savage  dual- 
ism were  highly  characteristic  of  the  age.  The  author  dreams 
that  he  sees  a  knight's  body  lying  on  a  bier,  and  the  soul  that 
has  just  parted  from  it  standing  by.  The  soul  gibes  at  the 
body,  and  curses  it  for  its  disobedience  :  it  would  go  its  own 
gait,  and  now  its  gluttony  and  lust  have  brought  them  both  to 
hell.  The  corpse  slowly  rears  its  head  and  replies  :  "  Thou 
dost  wrong  to  lay  all  the  blame  upon  me.  I  was  entrusted  to 
thy  guidance,  and  did  nothing  but  what  thou  didst  whisper  in 
my  ear.  Thou  art  lost  by  thine  own  fault,  and  but  for  thee  I 
should  be  as  a  sheep  or  an  ox,  and  not  be  bound  to  hell."  The 
soul  retorts  :  "  I  could  do  nothing  without  thee.  We  were  both 
born  of  one  woman;  I  loved  thee,  but  thou  wast  unruly;  I  was 
thy  slave,  and  now  must  suffer  for  thy  deadly  sins."  "  Nay, 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  39 

the  thought  of  every  sin  came  first  from  thee,  Soul  !  I  knew 
not  what  was  right  or  wrong  except  as  thou  didst  teach  me.  I 
was  inclined  to  sin,  as  is  the  race,  and  thou  didst  allow  me  my 
pleasure,  though  it  was  for  thee  to  beat  and  bind."  "  I  gave 
thee  good  advice,"  says  the  soul,  "but  the  fiend  and  the  world 
deceived  thee.  O  ye  traitors  !  combining  against  my  bliss  :  ye 
led  me  as  an  ox  is  led  by  the  horn,  and  have  brought  me  to 
hell-pain.  Now  no  prayer  avails  !  "  "  Oh  that  I  had  died  at 
birth  !  "  cries  the  corpse,  "  then  I  had  not  known  sin."  "  'Tis 
too  late,  Body!  We  must  go  our  way,  —  but  oh,  that  thou 
hadst  amended  only  a  little  while  ago !  Here  come  the  fiends, 
—  farewell  !  We  shall  meet  at  doomsday."  Then  the  devils 
swoop  upon  the  wretched  soul,  strike  their  claws  into  it,  tousle 
it  hither  and  thither,  drag  it  to  the  pit  of  hell,  hurl  it  over  the 
brink  —  and  the  dungeon  door  closes  upon  it.  With  the  horror 
the  sleeper  rouses  up,  aghast ;  and  thanks  God  that  he  is  still 
in  the  land  of  the  living,  and  by  repentance  may  hope  to 
escape  that  fearful  fate. 

If  we  turn  to  contemporary  literature  upon  the  continent  of 
Europe  we  shall  find  there  also  interesting  evidence  that  a 
serious  spirit  was  abroad  that  was  quite  out  of  touch  with  the 
spirit  of  those  light  romances,  full  of  love  and  war  and  adven- 
ture, in  which  the  former  age  delighted.  Among  the  songs  of 
Walther  von  der  Vogelweide  —  the  prince  of  the  Minnesingers 
(the  German  troubadours)  —  there  are  many  verses  that  show 
how  acutely  he  felt  the  discord  of  his  time.  Although  he  is 
remembered  now  for  his  love-songs,  and  especially  for  his  lively 
touches  of  natural  description,  a  serious,  moralizing  strain  was 
yet  the  chief  characteristic  of  his  genius.  The  shadow  of  the 
end  seemed  to  him  to  be  falling  upon  the  world;  he  saw  corrup- 
tion spreading  in  the  church,  and  anarchy  impending  in  the 
state.  The  correctness  of  this  latter  forecast  appeared  before 
the  next  generation  had  passed  away;  the  fall  of  the  house  of 
Hohenstaufen  was  followed  by  the  disorders  of  the  Interreg- 


40  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

num,  during  which  the  flower  of  German  song  faded,  and  the 
line  of  Minnesingers,  like  their  imperial  masters'  line,  became 
extinct. 

Sometime  about  the  year  1250  appeared  a  book  of  moral  in- 
struction called  "Der  Winsbecke,"  purporting  to  be  a  father's 
advice  to  his  son.  At  this  time  all  Germany  was  ringing  with 
the  eloquence  of  Berthold  Lech,  a  friar  of  the  order  of  St. 
Francis,  a  preacher  of  repentance,  and  of  interior  piety  as  con- 
trasted with  reliance  upon  indulgences,  the  merit  of  pilgrimages, 
and  the  intercessions  of  saints.  So  vast  were  the  crowds  that 
thronged  to  hear  him  that  no  building  would  hold  them,  and 
he  had  to  preach  in  the  fields.  His  sermons  are  models  of 
clear  German  prose. 

In  France,  too,  the  religious  revival  stimulated  by  the  men- 
dicant orders  gave  rise  to  much  sermon-writing  in  the  mother- 
tongue.  How  generally  prevalent  was  the  didactic  spirit 
exemplified  by  "  Der  Winsbecke  "  is  shown  by  the  appearance 
of  a  similar  work  in  French,  "  Le  Castoiement  d'un  Pere  " 
"A  Father's  Counsel"  —in  which  rules  of  conduct  are  im- 
pressed upon  the  memory  by  apposite  stories.  The  contrast 
between  the  two  great  periods  that  we  have  been  studying  is 
well  illustrated  by  the  works  of  the  famous  chroniclers,  Ville- 
hardouin  and  Joinville  :  the  former  wrote  a  history  of  the  con- 
quest of  Constantinople  (in  which  he  took  part)  in  the  year 
1204,  which  is  full  of  the  stir  and  color  of  the  times;  the  latter 
wrote,  in  a  sober  tone  that  was  suited  to  a  graver  period,  a 
history  of  his  royal  patron,  St.  Louis.  Of  writings  in  verse  we 
can  do  no  more  than  mention  the  lays  and  fables  of  Marie  de 
France  ;  the  lyrics  of  Thibault  de  Champagne  ;  and  the  "  Roman 
de  la  Rose,"  begun  by  Guillaume  de  Lorris,  who  died  about  the 
year  1260.  This  voluminous  work,  popular  for  ages  in  many 
lands,  has  been  suggestively  termed  a  "psychological  epic"; 
it  is  an  allegory,  and  through  it  all  a  moral  purpose  runs  ;  the 
Rose,  to  obtain  which  is  the  object  of  the  lover's  endeavor,  is 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  41 

the  recompense  of  faithful  love,  and  personified  sins —  such  as 
Sloth  and  Hatred  —  stand  in  the  way  of  its  attainment. 

After  the  blighting  Albigensian  crusade  the  sceptre  of  poetry 
passed  from  Provence  to  Northern  Italy,  where  it  was  wielded 
by  the  severe  Sordello  of  Mantua,  —  whose  shade  in  after 
years  guided  Dante  through  the  valley  to  the  gate  of  Purgatory. 
A  few  troubadours,  leaving  the  desolate  halls  of  their  patrons, 
who  had  fallen  in  the  wars,  wandered  over  the  Pyrenees  and 
sought  a  livelihood  in  Catalonia  and  Aragon.  Chief  among 
these  was  Pierre  Cardinal,  who  found  a  patron  in  Jayme  I, 
king  of  Aragon  ;  but  his  spirit  was  embittered  by  misfortune, 
and  in  satirical  songs  he  poured  contempt  upon  his  age.  The 
last  of  the  troubadours  was  Giraud  Riquier  of  Narbonne, 
who  was  befriended  by  Alfonso  the  Wise,  king  of  Castile. 
His  verses  suffer  from  that  didacticism  which  is  the  death  of 
poetry. 

The  representative  poet  of  Spain  in  this  age  was  the  priest 
Gonzalo  of  Berceo,  in  the  neighborhood  of  Calahorra.  He 
composed  rhyming  lives  of  saints,  "The  Martyrdom  of  St. 
Lawrence,"  and  the  "Merits"  and  "Miracles  of  the  Blessed 
Virgin  Mary."  He  died  sometime  after  the  year  1260.  At  the 
end  of  the  century  appeared  a  Spanish  version  of  "The  Debate 
of  the  Body  and  the  Soul." 


42  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 


III. 

THERE  stands  a  church  upon  the  embattled  acropolis  of  Car- 
cassonne —  the  old  church  of  St.  Nazaire  —  the  body  of  which, 
dating  from  the  eleventh  century,  is  gloomy  indeed.  Its  west- 
ern end  was  walled  up  long  ago,  in  time  of  war,  and  lets  in  no 
light ;  half  a  dozen  heavy  pillars  on  either  side  divide  the  aisles 
from  the  nave ;  overhead  lowers  a  cavernous  vault,  pierced  by 
no  openings.  The  chancel  end  is  bright,  and  going  toward  it 
one  finds  himself  surrounded  by  tinted  light  that  almost  dazzles 
after  the  darkness  left  behind.  Right  and  left  extend  spacious 
transepts,  —  above  are  springy  vaults, — and  round  about  are 
graceful  columns,  carvings,  and  large  windows  filled  with  the 
elegant  tracery  of  the  fourteenth  century,  and  the  gleam  of 
painted  glass.  Something  like  that  is  the  change  we  experience 
on  passing  from  the  shadows  of  the  last  age  into  the  light  of 
the  one  before  us. 

We  are  greeted  by  an  English  carol  that  begins  in  this  way : 
"  Spring  is  come  with  love  in  its  turn,  with  blossoms  and  with 
birds'  songs,  that  brings  all  this  bliss  ;  day's-eyes  in  the  dales, 
sweet  notes  of  nightingales,  —  every  bird  sings  its  song.  The 
thrustlecock  chides  them  ever ;  away  is  their  winter  woe  when 
woodruff  springs.  These  birds  sing  wondrous  many,  and 
whistle  in  their  winter  joy  so  that  all  the  wood  rings." 

This  is  one  of  a  number  of  refreshing  little  songs  of  love  and 
budding  branches,  spring  flowers  ancl  returning  birds. 

A  clever  poem  of  considerable  length,  showing  the  same 
genial  appreciation  of  nature  and  a  new-born  sense  of  humor, 
is  "  The  Owl  and  the  Nightingale,"  in  which,  in  sprightly 
couplets  well  suited  to  the  theme,  those  birds  flout  each  other, 
peck  each  other's  character  to  pieces,  and  celebrate  their 


DIVERSITY 
OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE)^ 


own  good  qualities.  "  Each  said  of  the  other's  habits  the 
very  worst  that  they  knew ";  it  was  a  "  stiff  debate."  The 
nightingale  sat  on  a  fair  bough,  among  blossoms,  in  a  thick 
hedge  mingled  with  spire  (tall  grass)  and  green  sedge;  near 
by,  on  an  old  ivy-covered  tree-trunk,  stood  the  owl.  The  night- 
ingale taunts  her  enemy  with  her  evil  look  and  "guggling" 
note ;  she  is  a  tyrant,  hated  by  small  birds  ;  moreover,  she 
feeds  on  nasty  creatures  like  snails  and  mice  and  such  "foul 
wights."  The  owl  swells  with  rage  :  "Why  won't  you  fly  out 
into  the  open,"  she  says,  "and  let  us  see  which  of  us  two  is 
fairer ?  "  "I  don't  care  to  have  you  claw  me  with  your  sharp 
cleavers,"  retorts  the  nightingale ;  "  shame  on  you  for  your 
treachery !  Tell  me,  monster,  why  do  you  sing  your  doleful 
song  by  night,  never  by  day?  'Tis  a  grisly  shriek  to  hear. 
You  fly  by  night  too, — you  love  darkness."  "I  sing  better 
than  you,  chatterer !  My  loud  note  is  not  like  your  feeble 
piping.  You  sing  all  day  and  all  night  long ;  your  piping  tires 
everybody."  "  Not  so,  owl !  Everything  is  glad  when  I  come. 
The  blossoms  begin  to  spring  and  spread  on  tree  and  in 
meadow  ;  the  lily  with  her  fair  beauty  welcomes  me,  prays  me  to 
fly  to  her ;  the  red  rose  too,  on  the  thorny  bush,  begs  me  to  sing 
for  her  love."  "  I  have  a  fine  dwelling  too,"  rejoins  the  owl : 
"  big  trees  with  thick  boughs,  all  overgrown  with  green  ivy  that 
never  fades  in  frost  or  snow  ;  in  winter  it  keeps  me  warm,  in 
summer  cool ;  my  house  is  bright  and  green  when  nothing  is 
left  of  yours.  You  jeer  at  me  for  my  food,  — but  what  do  you 
eat,  pray  ?  Is  it  not  spiders  and  flies  and  worms  ?  But  I  keep 
men's  houses  and  barns  free  from  mice,  —  churches,  too,  I 
cleanse  of  them ;  no  foul  wight  that  I  can  catch  ever  comes  to 
Christ's  house."  At  this  the  nightingale  is  out  of  all  patience : 
"  One  song  of  my  mouth  is  better  than  all  that  ever  you  could 
do.  My  notes  are  sweet,  like  the  songs  of  Holy  Church ;  in 
heaven  there  is  such  singing.  I  help  the  priests  at  matins,  and 
they  rejoice  in  my  song."  After  further  wrangling,  the  night- 


44  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

ingale  bursts  out,  as  if  victorious,  into  loud  warbling,  in  which 
a  choir  of  other  birds  join,  thrush  and  throstle  and  wood-wale; 
the  wren  calls  for  a  decision  ;  Nicholas  of  Guilford  (the  author's 
name,  no  doubt)  shall  be  the  umpire.  Away  they  fly  to  find 
him  —  "but  how  they  sped  in  their  judgment  I  can't  tell  you; 
here  is  no  more  of  this  tale." 

In  verse  similar  to  that  of  this  playful  piece  but  far  more 
fluent,  brighter  yet  in  color,  sprightlier  in  fancy,  is  a  short 
poem  called  "  The  Land  of  Cokaygne  "  —  "  Kitchen-land."  It 
is  a  satire  upon  the  luxury  that  was  already  beginning  to  invade 
and  corrupt  conventual  life,  but  its  tone  is  by  no  means  bitter, 
—  it  is  rather  that  of  amusement ;  it  was  written  in  the  spirit 
of  a  wag,  not  of  a  reformer.  Better  than  Paradise  —  where 
there  is  fruit  but  no  meat,  and  nothing  but  water  to  drink  —  is 
the  land  of  Cokaygne,  that  flows  with  oil,  milk,  honey,  and 
wine.  "Well  is  him  that  there  may  be."  In  that  land  there 
is  an  abbey  of  white  and  grey  monks  where  there  is  store  of 
flesh  and  fish ;  the  very  walls  are  built  of  pasties ;  in  the 
cloister  is  a  tree  of  spices  ;  a  well  of  treacle  is  hard  by.  To 
that  abbey  roast  geese  fly,  bringing  garlic.  After  dinner,  the 
young  monks  go  out  to  play,  —  and  here  the  humor  of  the 
piece  becomes  outrageous.  In  conclusion  it  is  said  that  to 
reach  that  delectable  land  one  must  wade  for  seven  years  up 
to  his  chin  in  swines'  filth. 

"  The  Land  of  Cokaygne  "  is  one  of  the  best  specimens  of 
light  satire  in  the  language.  The  appearance  of  such  a  piece 
signifies  much :  it  means  that  a  critical  spirit  is  abroad;  that 
fresh  powers  of  observation  are  coming  into  play ;  that  thought 
is  growing  independent. 

Collections  of  proverbs  —  those  digests  of  popular  experi- 
ence —  were  made  at  this  time,  and  were  in  great  demand. 
One  of  such  goes  by  the  name  of  Hendyng  —  some  legendary 
sage,  some  rustic  Solomon,  whose  name  became  a  generic  term 
for  all  makers  of  proverbs.  After  a  ballad-like  stanza,  in  which 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  45 

some  bit  of  popular  observation  is  unfolded,  the  whole  is  com- 
pactly summed  up  in  one  of  Hendyng's  sayings,  and  often 
made  yet  more  portable  by  being  clinched  with  a  rhyme  or  an 
assonance.  In  this  old  collection  occur  many  proverbs  that 
are  still  current :  "A  good  beginning  makes  a  good  ending,"  - 
"a  burnt  child  dreads  the  fire."  Other  examples  are  :  "  Hope 
of  long  life  beguiles  many  a  good  wife," — "when  need  is 
highest,  help  is  nighest,"  -  "  seldom  comes  loan  laughing 
home," —  "  well  he  fights  that  well  flies."  In  the  last  two  the 
assonance  is  still  preserved,  —  it  is  obscured  by  our  modern 
pronunciation  in  the  following  :  "  A  fool's  bolt  is  soon  shot." 

The  poetical  pieces  thus  far  noticed  were  simply  the  prelude 
to  masses  of  rhyme.  Long  rhyming  chronicles  appeared,  in 
which  Arthur  and  the  other  ancient  British  worthies  figured 
again  upon  the  scene.  Romances  full  of  love  and  fighting  and 
adventure  gathered  bulk  proportionate  to  the  popularity  of 
their  heroes.  It  is  plain  that  there  was  a  resurgence  in  some 
measure  of  the  spirit  of  the  age  of  Layamon. 

Portions  of  Scripture  history,  beginning  with  the  birth,  death, 
and  resurrection  of  Christ,  were  dramatised  and  acted  in  con- 
nection with  the  Corpus  Christi  festival,  —  first  instituted  by 
Pope  Urban  IV  in  1264,  and  appointed  to  be  kept  on  the 
Thursday  following  Trinity  Sunday.  These  representations 
were  called  miracle-plays,  and  at  last  mysteries  (in  order  to 
distinguish  them  from  other  miracle-plays  founded  on  the  lives 
of  saints) :  it  is  believed  that  a  series  of  them  was  acted  at  the 
town  of  Chester  within  a  few  years  from  the  date  given  above. 

This  promising,  fresh  beginning  of  English  literature  is  to  be 
explained  by  the  spirit  of  the  age  of  Edward  I.  As  unlike  his 
father's  as  was  the  character  of  that  great  sovereign,  so  unlike 
the  former  age  was  that  which  had  supervened.  The  pendulum 
of  thought  and  feeling  had  swung  over  a  wide  arc ;  a  new  set 
of  ideas  had  replaced  the  old.  Whereas  the  world,  in  its  double 
sense  of  external  nature  and  human  society,  had  seemed  to  be 


46  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

hopelessly  evil,  opposed  in  its  very  essence  to  heaven  and  to 
God,  and  whereas  the  human  body  had  been  despised  and 
hated  as  the  loathly  prison  of  the  soul,  now,  on  the  contrary, 
instructed  doubtless  by  the  unhappy  consequences  of  that  view 
of  things,  men  began  to  discover  goodness  and  beauty  in  the 
world  and  the  body ;  regarded  nature  with  the  genial  interest 
we  have  already  noted  ;  and  received  gratefully  the  pleasures 
of  the  senses.  The  human  spirit  began  to  feel  at  home  in  the 
body,  looked  about  it,  and  exerted  itself  to  improve  its  condi- 
tion. Thus  was  a  higher  unity  secured  after  the  painful  dis- 
cord of  the  previous  period. 

At  such  a  time  natural  science  is  born  ;  and  the  striking 
witness  to  this  fact  is  the  renowned  Franciscan  friar,  Roger 
Bacon.  The  story  of  his  troubled  life  marks  him  out  conspic- 
uously as  the  intellectual  pioneer  and  martyr  of  his  age.  His 
investigations  having  aroused  the  suspicion  of  his  superiors  in 
the  order,  he  was  kept  under  guard  in  Paris  for  a  whole  decade, 
and  was  deprived  of  instruments  and  books.  Happily  for  him, 
a  friend  of  former  years  was  raised  to  the  papal  throne  in 
1265  as  Clement  IV;  for  him  Bacon  managed  to  compose  a 
work  —  the  "Opus  Majus,"  a  synopsis  of  science  as  he  under- 
stood it,  —  which  brought  about  his  liberation,  and  in  1268  he 
was  in  his  native  land  of  England  once  more.  He  was  too 
eager  to  be  discreet;  his  impatience  with  ignorance  and  mental 
immobility  in  high  places  made  him  enemies  ;  the  general  of 
the  Franciscans  in  special  disliked  and  suspected  him ;  and  in 
1278  he  was  confined  at  Paris  again.  Ten  years  later,  the 
general  was  chosen  pope,  with  the  title  Nicholas  IV;  and  it 
was  not  until  his  death,  in  1292,  that  Bacon  was  set  free.  He 
returned  to  England  to  die. 

By  making  mathematics  the  ground  of  all  science  Bacon 
gave  unity  to  his  speculations.  He  excelled  in  alchemy  and 
optics,  —  studies  in  which  the  Saracens  had  been  without 
peers  for  fully  five  centuries.  As  an  explanation  of  the  back- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  47 

vvardness  of  science  throughout  Christendom,  Bacon  alleged 
four  causes  :  unquestioning  submission  to  authority,  the  force 
of  habit,  prejudice,  and  self-sufficient  ignorance.  The  only 
remedy,  he  said,  was  to  go  directly  to  nature,  and  question  her 
without  fear  and  without  prepossession.  The  scholastic 
method  of  argument  had  failed  to  increase  or  advance  knowl- 
edge :  that  could  only  be  done  by  experience,  by  experience  in 
its  twofold  sense,  external  observation  and  experiment  and 
internal  comprehension,  conception,  understanding.  The 
causes  of  sensation,  the  two  principles  of  physical  existence, 
he  made  to  be  matter  and  "  virtue  "  (in  the  sense  in  which  we 
speak  of  the  virtues,  properties,  or  powers  of  herbs):  these 
were  the  elements  of  natural  science.  Creation,  motion,  any 
effect  he  explained  by  the  action  of  a  "  virtue,"  or  quality,  or 
power,  upon  matter. 

Out  of  mere  justice  to  the  age  one  is  obliged  to  say  thus 
much  about  Bacon,  although  his  writings,  being  all  in  Latin, 
do  not  belong  to  English  literature. 

It  is  interesting  to  compare  with  him  his  almost  equally  mis- 
understood and  ill-used  contemporary,  the  star-gazing  king  of 
Castile,  Alfonso  X.  To  him  we  owe  the  simplification  of  our 
arithmetic  by  the  introduction  of  Arabic  numerals. 

Bacon  had  experimented  much  with  lenses,  but  it  was  left 
for  an  Italian,  Alessandro  Spina,  first  to  put  them  to  practical 
use  in  the  manufacture  of  eye-glasses. 

Another  Italian  meanwhile,  the  Neapolitan  Flavio  Gioja,  was 
experimenting  with  the  loadstone,  and  about  the  year  1302 
devised  a  compass  and  magnetic  needle. 

The  epoch  was  further  signalized  by  the  dissection  of  two 
human  bodies  at  Bologna,  in  1315,  by  the  professor  of  anat- 
omy, Mondini  di  Luzzi,  in  the  presence  of  the  medical  students 
of  the  university.  Up  to  that  time,  the  interior  structure  of 
the  human  body  had  been  inferred  from  that  of  lower  animals : 
the  great  Galen  even  derived  what  he  knew  of  it  from  the 


48  OUTLINE    OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

bodies  of  apes.  Mondini's  work  —  the  result  of  his  investiga- 
tions —  was  not  superseded  as  a  text-book  in  anatomy  for  two 
hundred  years. 

The  head  of  the  medical  profession  in  England  at  this  time 
was  John  Gatesden,  or  Gaddesden,  a  graduate  of  the  newly 
founded  Merton  College,  Oxford,  who  about  the  year  1299 
began  to  study  medicine,  and  soon  became  a  successful  practi- 
tioner in  London.  He  gained  celebrity  by  his  fanciful  treat- 
ment of  a  son  of  Edward  I  for  small-pox,  —  and  the  boy 
recovered.  Toward  the  close  of  that  king's  reign  Gatesden 
compiled  his  "  Rosa  Medicinae,"  drawing  heavily  upon  the 
writings  of  Arabian  doctors.  He  lived  to  a  great  age,  dying  in 
1361;  and  not  many  years  after  he  was  ranked  by  Chaucer 
among  the  greatest  physicians  of  all  time. 

A  feature  of  the  age  quite  as  remarkable  as  this  progress  of 
science  and  medicine  was  the  development  of  another  profes- 
sion, that  of  the  law.  Out  of  the  tumult  of  the  previous  period 
sprang  a  longing  for  order,  for  security  of  life  and  limb  and 
property,  that  favored  the  growth  of  law,  and  goes  far  to 
explain  the  rise  of  strong  governments  in  Europe  toward  the 
close  of  the  thirteenth  century.  In  England,  that  longing  was 
responded  to  by  Edward  I,  one  of  the  greatest  of  her  kings, 
whose  name  is  a  synonym  for  order,  able  government,  and 
legal  and  political  reform.  The  battle  of  Evesham,  in  1265, 
had  established  anew  the  royal  authority,  and  Edward  took 
advantage  of  the  tranquil  period  that  ensued  to  go  to  Palestine 
as  a  continuator  of  St.  Louis'  last  crusade.  There  his  valor 
and  military  prowess  gained  him  high  renown,  stirred  the 
patriotic  pride  of  his  people,  and  won  him  their  admiration  and 
affection  ;  upon  the  death  of  his  father  he  returned  to  England, 
in  1274,  to  take  up  the  reins  of  government  in  an  auspicious 
season.  The  kingdom  was  at  peace,  and  commerce  was  flour- 
ishing. The  year  after  his  return,  parliament  made  a  begin- 
ning of  customs  legislation  by  according  him  a  duty  on 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  49 

exported  wool,  which  was  all  that  was  needed  to  replenish  his 
treasury.  From  the  first  Edward  directed  his  attention  to  the 
strict  execution  of  justice  throughout  the  realm,  and  to  the 
development  of  law  and  of  a  better  judicial  system.  Interest 
in  the  subject  had  been  greatly  increased  by  a  valuable  com- 
pend,  "Of  the  Laws  and  Customs  of  England,"  by  a  late 
learned  jurist,  Henry  Bracton.  Edward  broke  up  the  old 
king's  court  into  its  constituent  parts,  and  established  these  as 
distinct  courts,  —  those  of  King's  Bench,  the  Exchequer,  and 
Common  Pleas ;  he  also  parted  the  martial  from  the  civil  func- 
tion of  the  justices  (the  union  of  which  was  characteristic  of 
the  feudal  age),  —  it  is  said  that  Ralph  Hengham,  first  chief 
justice  of  the  reconstructed  court  of  King's  Bench,  was  the  first 
who  did  not  wear  under  his  ermine  a  coat  of  mail. 

Great  as  Edward  was  as  a  law-giver  and  administrator,  he 
was  equally  great  and  successful  in  his  military  undertakings ; 
indeed,  it  is  the  brilliant  extension  of  his  authority  over  all 
Britain,  whereby  he  made  of  it  an  island-empire,  that  mention 
of  his  name  in  general  first  suggests.  Those  conquests  of  his, 
moreover,  accelerated  the  growth  of  sound  constitutional  gov- 
ernment, for  the  king's  necessities  forced  him  to  have  contin- 
ual recourse  to  parliaments,  and  to  gain  the  confidence  and 
support  of  shires  and  towns  by  giving  them  representation,  — 
and  grants  of  money  were  secured  by  concessions  on  his  part. 
In  1282  came  the  conquest  of  Wales  (one  cause,  without 
doubt,  of  the  revival  of  interest  in  Welsh  legends  which  we 
have  already  observed) ;  the  year  following,  Edward  called  four 
knights  from  every  shire  and  four  burgesses  from  every  corpo- 
rate town  to  devise  some  means  of  meeting  the  cost  of  the  war. 
In  1294,  in  consequence  of  a  serious  quarrel  with  Philip  the 
Fair  of  France,  he  had  to  make  a  similar  appeal ;  and  in  1295 
there  met  a  parliament  that  became  the  model  of  all  such 
assemblies  in  the  future.  Then  followed  the  war  with  Scotland 
—  for  Edward  had  allowed  himself  to  be  persuaded  by  his 


50  OUTLINE    OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

lawyers  that  he  had  a  just  claim  to  the  overlordship  of  that 
kingdom,  —  and  this  time  his  necessities  led  to  the  confirma- 
tion of  the  charters,  in  the  year  1297.  In  the  winter  of  1301, 
he  had  again  to  make  large  concessions  in  order  to  obtain  from 
the  barons  unanimous  rejection  of  the  arrogant  and  unprece- 
dented claim  lately  put  forth  by  Pope  Boniface  VIII  to  the 
suzerainty  of  Scotland.  In  1303,  Edward  made  a  triumphant 
military  progress  through  that  kingdom,  his  fleet  meanwhile 
skirting  its  shores. 

Among  contemporary  sovereigns  Edward  had  no  equal  as  a 
great  national  king.  Philip  IV  (the  Fair)  was  a  successful 
despot,  but  he  was  not  great ;  he  was  selfish  and  cruel ;  his 
influence  and  example,  and  the  result  of  his  strongly  central- 
ized government,  were  disastrous  to  France.  Yet  in  many 
respects  the  careers  of  the  two  monarchs  were  remarkably  like, 
and  show  in  an  instructive  way  with  what  different  motives  the 
same  line  of  policy  may  be  pursued.  Like  Edward,  Philip 
bent  all  his  energies  to  the  depression  of  feudalism,  and  to  that 
end  favored  the  jurists,  extended  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Parlia- 
ment of  Paris  to  the  virtual  suppression  of  lesser  courts,  and 
called  the  people  to  his  aid.  In  1302,  during  the  height  of  his 
contest  with  Boniface  VIII,  he  convened,  beside  the  clergy 
and  nobles,  representatives  of  the  Third  Estate.  It  was  the 
first  meeting  of  the  States-General,  and  was  analogous  to 
Edward's  parliament  of  1295.  That  contest  between  pope  and 
king  was  the  chief  concern  of  the  era ;  it  was  a  mortal  combat 
between  a  declining  and  a  rising  power;  the  legal,  critical, 
slightly  skeptical  temper  of  the  time  was  all  on  the  king's  side. 
After  the  collapse  of  the  papal  power,  Philip's  influence  in  the 
conclave  secured  the  election  of  a  Frenchman  as  pope,  who 
took  the  name  of  Clement  V,  was  invested  at  Lyons,  and  fixed 
his  residence  at  Avignon.  Having  humbled  the  mightiest  insti- 
tution of  the  middle  ages  and  made  it  subservient  to  his  ends, 
Philip  continued  his  war  with  feudalism  by  attacking  its 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  51 

wealthiest,  proudest,  and  most  powerful  representatives,  the 
Knights  Templars.  He  forced  the  pope  to  his  will,  and 
Clement  abolished  the  order  in  the  year  1312. 

The  tone  of  French  literature  was  prevailingly  satirical  in 
this  period,  as  is  shown  by  the  poems  of  Rutebceuf,  and  yet 
more  conspicuously  by  the  continuation  of  the  "  Romance  of 
the  Rose"  by  Jean  de  Meung  —  he  introduced  into  it  a  new 
and  significant  allegorical  personage,  "  False-Semblance,"  and 
grafted  upon  a  dreamy  exposition  of  the  metaphysic  of  love  a 
prolix  satire  upon  the  society  of  his  day.  A  consummate 
example  of  long-drawn  and  remorseless  satire  was  also  taking 
shape,  —  the  great  beast-fable  of  the  middle  ages,  the  "  Roman 
du  Renart."  There  is  something  terrible  in  the  cynical  con- 
tempt of  honor  displayed  in  this  poem,  this  apotheosis  of  base- 
ness, this  triumphant  career  of  coarse  and  cruel  trickery,  hypoc- 
risy, and  lust.  It  is  indicative  of  the  emergence  of  an  ignoble 
element  in  the  social  life  of  the  time,  destitute  of  any  high 
ideal,  yet  quick  to  discern  any  discrepancy  between  profession 
and  practice  on  the  part  of  its  superiors,  and  stirred  to  admira- 
tion only  by  successful  cunning. 

Late  in  the  thirteenth  century  the  sarcastic  Adam  de  la  Halle 
produced  the  first  comedy  of  modern  times  —  "  Li  Jus  Adam." 

Interesting  evidence  of  the  reaction  against  the  gloomy  ideas 
of  the  former  age  is  afforded  in  German  literature  by  some  of 
the  songs  of  Friedrich  von  Sonnenburg.  The  world,  he  de- 
clares, is  fair  and  good  ;  and  he  proves  it  in  true  mediaeval 
fashion  by  reference  to  the  bodies  of  Christ  and  his  saints, 
which  were  formed  of  its  substance  and  by  it  were  nourished ; 
the  resurrection  bodies  of  the  redeemed,  moreover,  will  be 
framed  of  it.  We  should  not  despise  the  world,  he  concludes, 
but  be  glad  that  we  are  in  it. 

While  Friedrich  was  preaching  this  wholesome  doctrine,  the 
energetic  Rudolf  of  Hapsburg,  king  of  the  Romans,  was  mak- 
ing his  part  of  the  world  pleasanter  to  live  in,  by  restoring 


52  OUTLINE   OF  THE  PHILOSOPHY 

order  and  maintaining  the  peace  of  the  Empire  as  far  as  he 
was  able.  He  repressed  the  violence  of  the  barons,  razed  the 
castles  of  the  refractory,  and  cleared  the  highways  of  the  rob- 
ber bands  that  infested  them.  He  was  wise  in  his  generation, 
and  made  friends  of  the  people. 

With  the  rise  of  the  people  in  political  importance,  a  vein  of 
satire  cropped  out  in  German  literature  also,  appearing  most 
conspicuously  in  the  homely  verse  of  Hugo  von  Trimberg. 

Even  the  hastiest  survey  of  the  age  would  be  incomplete 
were  we  not  to  mention  again  that  remarkable  man,  Alfonso  X 
(the  Wise),  brother-in-law  of  Edward  I,  —  his  sister,  the  noble 
Eleanor,  become  Edward's  queen.  Alfonso  had  the  Bible 
translated  into  Spanish,  and  had  a  chronicle  of  Spanish  history 
and  a  great  code  of  laws  and  customs  compiled,  also  in  the 
native  language.  The  Code  took  its  title  —  "  Las  Siete  Parti- 
das  "  —  from  its  seven  main  divisions.  These  were  the  first 
great  monuments  of  Spanish  prose.  .  A  little  later  the  fluent 
Italian  language  was  moulded  by  the  mighty  genius  of  Dante, 
who  stands,  Janus-like,  between  two  worlds,  his  backward  gaze 
piercing  depths  of  gloom  until  it  is  lost  in  the  silvery  light  of 
classic  literature,  while  his  forward  face,  flushed  with  the  sun- 
rise of  the  Renascence,  seems  to  command  all  coming  time. 

To  Aquinas  and  Bonaventura  Dante  was  profoundly  in- 
debted, and  he  more  than  paid  what  he  owed  them :  the  theol- 
ogy of  the  one  and  the  mysticism  of  the  other,  transmuted  by 
him  into  poetry,  were  freed  from  the  shackles  of  the  technical 
and  professional,  and  attained  a  universal  validity.  It  is,  of 
course,  unnecessary  to  look  beyond  the  sixth  book  of  the 
^Eneid  for  the  suggestion  of  the  general  design  of  the  Divine 
Comedy,  but  in  the  middle  ages  more  than  one  monkish  vis- 
ionary had  made  the  same  awful  journey  as  Virgil's  hero,  and 
had  not  been  deterred,  as  he  was,  from  exploring  the  terrific 
city  of  Dis,  —  and  in  their  steps  Dante  trod.  Bede's  account 
of  Drithelm's  vision  was  mentioned  long  since ;  yet  more  strik- 


ing  and  detailed  is  the  account  given  by  Roger  of  Wendover 
(a  precursor  of  Matthew  Paris),  among  his  annals  of  the  year 
1196,  of  a  certain  monk  of  Evesham  who,  while  his  body  lay 
in  trance,  was  conducted  by  St.  Nicholas  through  the  doleful 
regions  where  souls  received  fitting  punishment  for  their  sins. 

The  Divine  Comedy  may  be  read  as  the  history  of  a  soul 
that  has  struggled  from  darkness  into  light.  It  is  a  record  of 
the  travail  of  its  author's  own  century,  as  it  passes  out  of  the 
horror  of  great  darkness,  the  lurid  gleams  and  deadly  fear  of 
the  Inferno,  through  the  milder  shades  of  Purgatory,  to  the 
peace  and  faith  and  radiance  of  the  Paradise.  The  lofty  invo- 
cation to  the  Virgin  at  the  very  close  of  the  vast  poem  merits 
special  attention ;  it  was  in  Dante's  time  that  the  cultus  of 
Mary  reached  its  consummation ;  it  was  firmly  established 
henceforth  as  an  essential  element  in  the  popular  faith,  was 
defended  and  expounded  by  doctors,  enriched  the  services  of 
the  church,  and  became  the  inspiration  of  poets  and  artists. 
To  the  Franciscan  order  this  access  of  devotion  was  primarily 
due ;  St.  Bonaventura  composed  a  Litany  of  the  Blessed  Vir- 
gin, and  about  the  year  1300  Duns  Scotus,  the  subtle  school- 
man, defended  with  many  refined  arguments  the  lately  devel- 
oped doctrine  of  her  immaculate  conception.  In  this  he 
antagonised  the  conservative  Aquinas,  as  he  did  his  theological 
system  in  general,  enlarging  the  domain  of  faith  in  doctrinal 
matters  at  the  expense  of  that  of  reason.  The  Carmelites 
strove  to  outdo  the  Franciscans  in  devotion  to  Mary;  they 
called  themselves  her  friars,  and  boasted  that  she  had  shown 
their  order  peculiar  favor.  The  Servites  took  their  title  from 
the  special  service  they  professed  to  her.  The  first  great 
Christian  painter,  Giovanni  Cimabue,  thrilled  the  heart  of 
Florence  with  joy  by  his  colossal  picture  of  the  Madonna, 
and  a  little  later  the  new  cathedral  of  that  city,  built  by  the 
eminent  architect  Arnolfo,  was  dedicated  to  St.  Mary  of  the 
Lily. 


54  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

A  clue  to  the  secret  source  of  this  outburst  of  devotional 
fervor  is  afforded  by  the  two  wonderful  hymns  of  the  thirteenth 
century,  the  "  Dies  Irae  "  and  the  "  Stabat  Mater,"  the  former 
uttering  in  awe-struck  accents  the  burden  of  the  first  half  of 
the  century,  the  latter  opening  out  in  the  last  half  a  way  of 
relief.  Both  are  believed  to  have  been  composed  by  Francis- 
can friars.  The  Dies  Irae  exhibits  a  soul  conscious  only  of 
two  awful  facts — itself  and  God:  its  poverty,  helplessness,  sin- 
fulness,  and  abysmal  alienation  from  a  terribly  majestic  and 
offended  Deity.  The  Stabat  Mater  interposes  a  screen  be- 
tween the  trembling  soul  and  its  Maker;  the  Virgin  Mother 
is  the  intermediary  who  dispenses  grace  and  pardon  from 
above,  stirs  up  holy  affections  in  the  human  heart,  and  will 
plead  for  the  sinner  at  the  judgment  so  shudderingly  expected. 
Thus  the  awful  gulf  was  bridged,  and  the  guilt-burdened  spirit 
poured  itself  forth  in  the  very  abandonment  of  adoration  to- 
ward that  gracious  figure,  all  mercy  and  mildness,  who  had 
herself  sounded  the  depths  of  human  sorrow,  and  forgot  its 
own  anguish  in  contemplating  hers. 

This  motion  of  sympathy  broke  up  the  stony  ground  of  the 
heart,  and  a  spring-tide  of  art  ensued.  To  the  year  1288  — 
the  first  of  the  pontificate  of  Nicholas  IV,  for  whom  it  was 
done  —  belongs  the  great  mosaic  representing  the  Coronation 
of  the  Virgin  in  the  apse  of  Sta  Maria  Maggiore  at  Rome.  In 
the  church  of  Sta  Maria  sopra  Minerva  a  mosaic  over  the  tomb 
of  Durandus,  who  died  in  1296,  presents  the  great  symbolist 
and  ritualist  on  his  knees  before  a  Madonna  that  might  have 
been  designed  by  Cimabue.  At  Florence  and  Siena  flourish- 
ing schools  of  fresco-painting  arose  under  Giotto  and  Duccio. 
Those  great  masters  loosed  the  swathing  bands  of  art;  their 
work  is  characterized  by  a  mobility,  lifelikeness,  and  varied 
expression  of  feeling  before  unknown.  In  his  department 
Giotto  was  as  eminent  a  man  as  his  friend  Dante  (whose  por- 
trait he  painted)  was  in  his  ;  it  is  pleasant  to  think  of  the 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE,  55 

intercourse  between  them  at  Padua,  Dante  looking  on  and 
conversing  while  Giotto  covered  the  walls  of  the  Arena  Chapel 
with  scenes  from  the  lives  of  the  Virgin  -Mother  and  her  son. 

The  epoch  was  further  rendered  illustrious  by  a  revival  of 
sculpture,  under  a  fresh  and  direct  study  of  nature  and  of 
remains  of  ancient  art.  Now  it  was  that  the  Pisani  carved 
and  cast  their  pulpits,  statues,  tombs,  and  doors. 

The  reign  of  Edward  I  was  the  flowering  time  of  mediaeval 
English  art.  Gothic  architecture  then  attained  its  relative 
perfection  in  the  introduction  of  geometrical  tracery,  which, 
coming  midway  between  the  severity  of  the  lancet  style  and  the 
weakness  of  flowing  tracery,  was  capable  of  endless  variety 
without  extravagance  and  of  perfect  adaptation  to  openings  of 
any  form.  This  beautiful  style  is  exhibited  in  the  Angel  Choir 
at  Lincoln,  which  belongs  to  the  early  years  of  Edward  I,  and 
in  the  nave  of  York  and  the  Chapter-house  at  Wells,  begun 
about  the  middle  of  his  reign.  The  sculptures  of  the  Angel 
Choir,  too,  give  evidence  of  the  taste  and  skill  of  the  period. 
The  leafy  capitals  of  columns  show  the  effect  of  the  new  study 
of  nature,  as  do  the  carvings  of  the  exquisite  crosses  reared  by 
Edward  wherever  the  body  of  Queen  Eleanor  rested  on  its  way 
to  interment  in  Westminster  Abbey.  The  fine  recumbent  fig- 
ures in  bronze  upon  the  tombs  of  Henry  III  and  Eleanor  were 
the  work  of  William  Torel,  —  but  who  he  was  it  is  impossible 
now  to  ascertain;  some  insist  that  he  was  an  Englishman, 
others,  that  he  was  an  Italian  of  the  school  of  the  Pisani. 
The  latter  claim  at  least  testifies  to  the  excellence  of  his  work. 
The  beautiful  grille  by  Eleanor's  tomb  is  a  specimen  of  the 
delicate  iron-work  of  his  time. 

After  this  sweeping  glance  at  the  manifold  activity  of  the 
age  we  turn  again  to  the  literature,  which  we  are  now  better 
prepared  to  appreciate.  One  of  the  first  points  to  arrest  our 
attention  is  the  great  influence  of  French  literature  and  lan- 
guage upon  English :  the  statutes  of  Edward's  reign  were 


56  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

couched  in  French  (instead  of  Latin  as  before)  ;  chronicles, 
romances,  mysteries,  were  done  into  English ;  and  French 
words  were  naturalized  in  the  language  in  such  numbers  as  to 
make  this  an  epoch  in  its  history.  The  first  who  thus  enlarged 
the  vocabulary  was  the  monk  Robert  of  Gloucester,  who, 
about  the  year  1300,  wrote  in  the  southern  dialect  a  rhyming 
history  of  England  that  begins  with  the  mythical  Brutus  and 
ends  with  the  reign  of  Henry  III.  Thus  the  first  part  of  his 
chronicle  covers  the  same  ground  as  Layamon's,  but  Robert 
greatly  abridges  the  history  of  the  British  kings  in  order  to 
make  room  for  later  dynasties.  Like  Layamon,  he  dwells 
upon  the  story  of  Arthur  in  a  tone  of  admiration  and  regret. 
This  new  invasion  of  English  literature  by  the  Britons  made 
amends  for  the  recent  conquest  of  Wales.  One  cannot  fail  to 
see  in  the  good  monk's  record  of  British,  Saxon,  Danish,  Nor- 
man, and  Angevin  dynasties  an  evidence  of  patriotic  pride,  of 
the  rising  national  spirit,  and  of  the  union  of  races  now  hap- 
pily achieved.  His  chronicle  contains  twelve  thousand  lines 

—  equivalent  to  twice  as  many  of  the  short  lines  of  Layamon. 
To  Robert  has  been  ascribed  a  set  of  Lives  of  Saints  —  Kath- 
arine,   Lucy,   Christopher,  Ursula   and  the    Eleven   Thousand 
Virgins,  Swithin,  Dunstan,  Edmund  the  Confessor  and  others 

—  that  are  written  in  the  same  dialect  and  verse  as  his  history. 
In  the  life  of  St.  Swithin  occurs  an  interesting  touch  of  criti- 
cism of  the  bishops  for  their  pageantry  in  the  consecration  of 
churches,  —  the  good  Swithin  did  not  make  such  display. 

In  the  year  1303,  Robert  Mannyng,  of  Brunne,  in  Lincoln- 
shire, a  member  of  the   order  of  St.  Gilbert  of  Sempringham, 
translated   into  English  verse  a  French  treatise   called  "The 
Hand-book    of    Sins."        He    called    his    version    "  Handlyng 
Synne"  —using  the  term  "handling"  in  the  sense  of  "touch- 
ing "  or  "  concerning."     It  deals  with  the  seven  deadly  sins  — 
pride,  envy,  anger,  covetousness,    sloth,   gluttony,  lechery,— 
illustrating  them  with  stories  that  enforce  the  duty  and  advan- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  57 

tage  of  practising  their  contrary  virtues.  Many  years  later,  at 
the  bidding  of  his  prior,  Mannyng  translated,  also  out  of  the 
French,  a  rhyming  history  of  England.  This  work,  which  was 
designed  for  the  instruction  and  entertainment  of  the  common 
people,  goes  over  the  ground  that  Robert  of  Gloucester  had 
lately  occupied,  with  the  addition  of  the  reign  of  Edward  I  — 
whom  Mannyng  greatly  admired.  An  English  version  of  St. 
Bonaventura's  "  Meditations  on  the  Lord's  Supper,  and  Hours 
of  the  Passion,"  which  is  marked  by  much  sweetness  of  phrase 
and  feeling,  has  been  attributed  to  him. 

These  writings  are  of  importance  in  the  history  of  the  lan- 
guage. They  are  in  the  Midland  dialect,  and  show  it  in  its 
final  phrase,  just  before  it  rose  to  recognition  as  the  English 
language  proper.  The  changes  that  we  noticed  in  connection 
with  the  speech  of  Layamon  have  been  progressing ;  the 
various  terminations  of  Anglo-Saxon  have  become  (with  few 
exceptions)  indistinguishable,  having  been  melted  down  to  a 
universal  <?,  —  and  even  that  is  beginning  to  drop  off,  especially 
from  adjectives ;  es  is  now  established  as  the  regular  plural  of 
substantives;  and  the  vocabulary  has  been  swelled  by  new 
words  of  French  derivation  that  greatly  outnumber  those  even 
that  were  introduced  by  Mannyng's  elder  contemporary,  the 
monk  of  Gloucester.  Already  the  language  has  a  decidedly 
modern  look :  it  is  hardly  if  at  all  more  difficult  to  understand 
than  Chaucer's. 

A  certain  melancholy  interest  attaches  to  Adam  Davy's 
"Dreams  about  King  Edward  II,"  because  their  glowing  va- 
ticinations of  his  miraculous  escape  from  assassination,  his 
election  as  emperor,  coronation  by  the  pope,  and  subsequent 
crusade  under  Christ's  guidance,  are  in  such  woful  contrast 
with  his  unhappy  career  and  horrible  end. 

As  the  Corpus  Christi  festival  had  not  yet  attained  great 
popularity  or  come  into  general  observance,  Pope  Clement  V 
promulgated  it  anew  at  the  Council  of  Vienne  in  the  year 


58  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

1311.  Five  years  later,  Pope  John  XXII  ordered  that  it 
should  be  celebrated  everywhere  with  solemn  processions.  As 
the  festival  rose  thus,  rapidly  in  importance,  so,  we  may  pre- 
sume, did  the  dramatic  representations  that  were  connected 
with  it  increase  in  number  and  popularity.  Those  five  years 
may  be  referred  to  as  the  time  when  a  fresh  impulse  was  given 
to  the  performance  of  mysteries  ;  then  the  famous  collections 
known  as  the  Chester,  Wakefield,  Coventry,  and  York  plays 
were  taking  shape.  These  sets  contained  from  two-  to  four- 
dozen  plays  apiece  ;  it  took  days,  sometimes  even  a  week  to 
present  them  ;  they  were  acted  by  members  of  the  town  guilds 
upon  movable  scaffolds  in  the  market-places  or  open  spaces 
before  churches.  In  some  instances  they  became  an  accom- 
paniment of  the  annual  fairs  that  drew  a  great  concourse  of 
country  people  to  town.  They  were  in  truth  the  chief  means 
of  popular  religious  instruction,  for  sermons  were  few  :  Arch- 
bishop Peckham  of  Canterbury  had  lately  had  to  require  his 
priests  to  preach  at  least  once  every  three  months.  The 
mysteries  unfolded  in  long  panorama  the  great  events  in  the 
history  of  man's  redemption  ;  a  series  of  them  would  embrace 
these  and  similar  subjects:  the  Fall  of  the  Angels  —  the 
Creation  —  the  Fall  of  Man  —  Cain  and  Abel  —  Noah  —  the 
Sacrifice  of  Isaac  —  the  story  of  Balaam  —  the  birth  of  Christ, 
Visit  of  the  Shepherds,  and  of  the  Three  Kings  —  the  Flight 
into  Egypt  —  Massacre  of  the  Innocents  —  Miracles  of  Christ, 
especially  the  Raising  of  Lazarus  —  the  Conspiracy  of  Pilate 
and  Caiaphas  —  the  Crucifixion  —  Harrowing  of  Hell — Res- 
urrection —  walk  to  Emmaus  —  Ascension  —  appearance  of 
Antichrist,  and  Day  of  Judgment. 

This  list  reminds  one  of  the  frescoes  of  the  same  scenes  and 
subjects  that  were  at  this  very  time  beginning  to  bloom  upon 
the  walls  of  Italian  churches.  The  passion  of  the  age  for  such 
graphic  synopses  of  Bible  history  is  revealed  again  in  the 
high  popularity  of  the  "  Cursor  M'undi,"  or  Course  of  the 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  59 

World,  a  voluminous  poem  in  the  Northern  dialect,  ascribed  to 
the  latter  part  of  the  reign  of  Edward  II.  Its  prologue,  which 
consists  of  only  two  hundred  and  seventy  lines,  is  really  inter- 
esting for  the  glimpse  of  contemporary  romance  with  which  it 
begins  ;  in  it,  too,'  the  author  has  kindly  told  us  just  what  he  is 
going  to  write  about,  and  has  spared  us  the  necessity  of  read- 
ing further.  Men  love  (he  says)  to  hear  rhymes  and  romances 
of  Alexander,  Julius  Caesar,  and  the  strong  strife  of  Greece 
and  Troy;  of  Brut,  Arthur,  Gawain,  and  Kay,  their  adven- 
tures and  the  wonders  that  befell  them  ;  of  Charles  and  Roland, 
and  their  wars  against  the  Saracens  ;  of  Tristram,  Isambras, 
and  Amadas,  —  vain  shadows  all.  Earthly  love  is  a  phantom  ; 
those  who  can  should  rhyme  of  the  blessed  Mother  of  God, 
and  her  love.  In  her  honor  he  will  write  and  tell  of  the  old 
and  new  law,  —  of  the  fall  of  the  Angels,  of  Adam,  Noah, 
Abraham  and  Isaac,  Jacob  and  Esau,  Joseph,  Moses,  David, 
and  Solomon;  then  of  Christ's  coming,  of  Joachim  and  St. 
Ann,  the  birth  of  Mary  and  of  her  Son,  the  Three  Kings, 
Herod's  slaughter,  the  flight  into  Egypt,  the  baptism  and  temp- 
tation of  Christ,  his  miracles,  crucifixion,  harrowing  of  hell, 
resurrection,  and  ascension  ;  and  finally  of  the  lives  of  the 
Twelve  Apostles,  the  assumption  of  Mary,  the  revelation  of 
Antichrist,  and  the  Day  of  Doom.  All  this  he  will  write  in 
English  tongue,  for  the  love  of  Englishmen,  that  the  common 
folk  of  England  may  understand  it.  Everywhere  one  finds 
French  rhymes,  — but  let  there  be  to  each  his  own  language. 

In  this  list,  as  in  that  of  the  mysteries,  one  is  struck  by  the 
width  of  the  leap  from  Old  to  New  Testament  times  :  the 
great  prophetic  period  seems  to  be  entirely  ignored.  But 
the  author  of  the  "  Cursor  Mundi  "  is  better  than  his  word, 
and  in  the  body  of  his  work  partly  fills  the  gap  by  some 
account  of  Elijah,  and  of  the  prophecies  of  Isaiah  and  Jere- 
miah. He  devotes  about  ten  thousand  lines  to  Old  Testament 
history  and  prophecy,  and  about  fourteen  thousand  to  the 


60  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

(partly  apocryphal)  Gospel  story,  and  the  Last  Things.  All 
through  the  work  much  legendary  matter  is  inwoven.  The 
popularity  of  a  production  like  this  is  to  be  explained  (as  in 
the  case  of  the  "  Ormulum  ")  by  the  ecclesiastical  prohibition 
of  translations  of  the  Bible.  The  Psalter  only  was  permitted 
to  be  translated  ;  and  a  version  of  it  was  made  in  English 
prose  by  William  of  Shoreham,  in  Kent,  about  the  year  1327. 

To  the  same  date  belongs  a  series  of  rhyming  homilies  in 
the  Northern  dialect.  The  preacher  begins  with  a  slight  para- 
phrase of  the  Sunday's  lesson,  proceeds  to  an  exposition  of 
it  that  inclines  strongly  to  allegory,  and  points  the  whole  with 
an  appropriate  tale.  It  was  an  age  of  story-telling ;  one 
misses  its  full  flavor  unless  he  perceives  the  na'ive  and  child- 
like delight  with  which  men  and  women  listened  then  to  tales 
of  marvel  and  adventure. 

The  prologue  to  "  Cursor  Mundi "  classifies  excellently  the 
rhymed  romances  that  were  steadily  increasing  in  popularity 
through  the  reign  of  the  first  two  Edwards.  To  the  groups 
there  indicated  should  be  added  certain  suggestions  of  an  old 
Danish  and  Saxon  group,  the  "  Lay  of  Havelok  the  Dane  " 
and  "King  Horn."  These  are  both  translations  from  the 
French  —  as,  indeed,  all  the  romances  are.  Horn  was  a  ban- 
ished prince,  courteously  received  by  King  Aylmar,  whose 
daughter  Rimenhild  falls  desperately  in  love  with  him.  Before 
he  can  marry  her  he  must  be  knighted,  and  prove  himself 
worthy  of  her  by  valiant  deeds.  So  he  goes  in  search  of 
adventure,  beheads  hundreds  of  Saracens,  enters  the  service 
of  the  King  of  Ireland,  kills  the  giant  champion  of  a  heathen 
host,  —  and  is  suddenly  called  home  by  a  messenger  from 
Rimenhild,  who  has  been  betrothed  against  her  will  to  a 
neighboring  prince.  Horn  braves  the  king  ;  tells  him  he  will 
conquer  his  own  land  and  return  for  Rimenhild ;  he  does  so, 
bears  her  away  in  triumph  and  makes  her  his  queen.  This  is 
in  brief  the  simple  theme  upon  which  a  host  of  romances 
merely  ring  the  changes. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.^  ^%T" 

M^ALlFOn^ 

In  the  cycle  of  stories  about  Charlemagne  and^  Roland 
echoes  of  the  old  "  Chansons  de  Gestes  "  sounded  in  England. 
One  cannot  but  feel  more  interest,  however,  in  stories  that  were 
native  to  the  soil,  such  as  the  Arthurian  legends,  chief  among 
which  were  those  of  Joseph  of  Arimathea,  Merlin,  Lancelot 
of  the  Lake,  the  Quest  of  the  Grail,  and  the  Death  of  Arthur. 
The  Tale  of  Troy  derived  its  popularity  partly  from  its  imag- 
ined connection  with  the  history  of  Britain. 

A  set  of  tales  and  apologues  of  Oriental  origin  that  goes  by 
the  name  of  the  "Seven  Sages"  is  significant  because  it 
taught  western  writers  to  string  together  a  number  of  stories 
upon  a  slender  thread  of  narrative.  The  tales  referred  to  are 
fourteen  in  number ;  seven  of  them  are  told  by  a  wicked 
queen  with  intent  to  prejudice  her  husband's  mind  against 
his  innocent  son,  who  must  be  speechless  for  a  week;  their 
effect  is  counteracted  by  the  other  seven,  told  by  the  sages  ; 
and  the  king  is  thus  amused  until  the  fatal  week  is  past,  after 
which  the  prince's  tongue  is  loosed,  he  clears  himself  com- 
pletely, and  the  bad  queen  is  put  to  death. 

The  adventures  of  two  English  heroes,  Bevis  of  Hampton 
and  Guy  of  Warwick,  were  unsurpassed  in  popularity  —  if  we 
may  judge  by  their  great  length,  and  the  way  in  which  they 
have  been  patched  and  added  to  by  later  hands.  Bevis  was 
the  son  of  an  English  earl.  Even  as  a  child  he  performs 
wonderful  feats  of  strength  and  valor,  but  his  wicked  mother 
sells  him  into  slavery  to  the  Saracens.  The  Sultan's  daughter 
Josyan  falls  in  love  with  him  ;  after  manifold  adventures  in 
paynim  and  Christian  lands,  he  marries  her  ;  and  their  son 
Guy  is  crowned  king  by  the  dying  Sultan.  Much  better  is  the 
romance  of  Guy  of  Warwick,  with  whom,  as  a  type  of  chivalry, 
we  may  close  this  account  of  the  literature  of  the  age.  Guy 
was  a  son  of  the  steward  of  the  Earl  of  Warwick  ;  he  was 
shapely,  brave,  and  strong.  He  dares  to  love  the  Earl's 
daughter,  Felice,  —  but  she  disdains  him.  In  a  vision  she  is 


62  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

warned  to  be  kind  to  him  ;  she  bids  him  be  knighted,  and 
when  that  is  done,  bids  him  seek  adventure  that  he  may  prove 
himself  worthy  of  her.  For  a  year  he  fights  and  jousts,  and 
returns  famous  :  still  she  is  not  satisfied.  He  sets  off  again, 
meets  with  unimaginable  adventures,  kills  the  Sultan,  is  be- 
trothed to  the  daughter  of  the  Emperor  of  the  East,  —  but  is 
reminded  of  Felice  by  the  sight  of  the  wedding  ring.  He 
escapes  the  match  by  getting  into  a  broil  with  a  courtier  ; 
leaves  Constantinople,  and  after  more  adventures  arrives  in 
England.  He  slays  an  invulnerable  dragon  that  was  wasting 
Northumberland  ;  is  joyfully  received  at  Warwick,  and  is 
wedded  to  Felice,  whose  scruples  are  now  entirely  overcome. 
Erelong,  compunction  of  conscience  sets  him  roving  upon  a 
pilgrimage  :  he  visits  Jerusalem,  and  after  a  few  final  adven- 
tures, returns  home  to  fight  a  giant,  the  champion  of  an  invad- 
ing Danish  host ;  and  then  retires  to  a  forest  hermitage  to  die. 
These  romances  were  the  delight  of  the  feudal  aristocracy, 
and  continually  bring  before  the  mind's  eye  the  gay  business 
of  their  lives,  their  hunting,  hawking,  jousting,  fighting,  and 
feasting ;  and  present  beside  pictures  of  the  castles  —  barbi- 
can, drawbridge,  portcullis,  gloomy  gate,  and  open  bailey  sur- 
rounded by  parapeted  walls  and  towers  —  in  whose  sombre 
halls  they  were  chanted  by  the  minstrels.  Edward  I  built 
castles  on  a  new  plan,  of  which  those  he  reared  at  Carnarvon 
and  Conway  are  splendid  examples  :  the  keep  now  left  its 
lordly  central  position  and  was  engaged  with  half-a-dozen  other 
towers  in  the  castle  wall,  which  enclosed  a  bailey  of  a  rudely 
oval  outline.  The  apartments  in  the  towers,  lighted  by  loop- 
holes for  windows,  so  dim  that  lamps  had  to  be  lit  while  it  was 
yet  day,  badly  ventilated  too,  filled  with  smoke  from  the  gusty 
fireplace  when  the  wind  blew  the  wrong  way,  must  have  been 
uncomfortable  enough,  in  spite  of  the  sparse  rushes  strewn 
upon  the  floor,  the  arras  that  covered  the  damp  walls,  and  the 
soft  divans  —  memorials  of  intercourse  with  the  East. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  63 

The  rest  of  the  literature,  —  rhyming  chronicles,  paraphrases 
of  Bible  history,  and  religious  poems  —  sprang  from  another 
source,  the  monasteries.  The  antithesis  between  these  two 
classes  of  writings  —  the  romantic  and  the  religious  —  is  well 
expressed  in  the  prologue  to  "  Cursor  Mundi."  Of  the  grand 
churches,  rivalling  cathedrals,  that  bounded  the  cloisters  on 
their  northern  side,  the  most  beautiful  was  Tintern  Abbey,  re- 
built in  the  perfect  style  of  the  time  of  Edward  I.  About  the 
cloisters  and  the  little  sunny  gardens  they  enclosed  were  the 
chapter-house,  scriptorium,  or  library,  where  the  work  of  copy- 
ing and  illuminating  manuscripts  went  on,  hospice,  where  trav- 
ellers were  entertained,  dormitories  for  the  brothers,  almonry 
where  food,  clothing,  and  medicines  were  doled  to  the  poor, 
refectory,  kitchen,  cellars,  and  offices.  The  mere  enumeration 
of  thes,e  buildings  indicates  how  important  an  agency  such  an 
institution  must  have  been  in  the  social  life  of  the  time.  The 
life  of  the  monks  was  regulated  by  the  canonical  hours  ;  after 
service  at  prime  (6  o'clock  in  the  morning)  they  worked,  in 
summer,  for  four  hours ;  then  read  until  sext  (midday),  when 
they  had  a  meal ;  rested  through  the  heat  of  the  day,  and 
after  nones  (3  o'clock)  worked  until  evensong.  They  were 
allowed  each  a  pound  of  bread  a  day,  and  two  meals  of  two 
cooked  dishes  and  a  dish  of  fruit.  At  bed-time  compline  was 
sung,  and  then  they  went  to  rest  upon  their  mattresses  of  straw. 
But  the  severity  of  this  rule  was  beginning  in  many  places  to 
be  relaxed,  and  the  simple  life  of  former  years  to  be  corrupted 
by  worldliness  and  self-indulgence. 

Castle  and  convent  were  now  declining  institutions,  types  of 
a  system  passing  away,  its  work  nearly  done.  The  centre  of 
interest  shifts  to  the  growing  towns,  and  homes  of  the  people. 
Everywhere  there  were  rising,  at  first  under  the  protection  of 
baron,  bishop,  or  abbot,  but  now,  in  securer  times,  farther 
away,  villages  of  perhaps  one  hundred  souls,  farmers',  weavers', 
and  tanners'  families,  their  cottages  arranged  in  line  along  a 


64  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

X  road,  near  a  stream.  The  cottage  floor  was  simply  trodden 
earth ;  around  the  walls  'were  chests  ;  a  brass  pot,  wooden 
trenchers,  and  pottery  were  the  household  utensils ;  chimneys 
were  perhaps  just  beginning  to  be  built,  but  as  a  rule  the 
smoke  of  the  fire  was  allowed  to  escape  through  a  hole  in  the 
roof.  A  ladder  led  to  the  snug  sleeping  loft  overhead,  under 
the  thatch.  The  house  was  scented  by  the  heap  of  refuse  that 
fermented  for  months  at  a  time  just  outside  the  door.  The 
farmer's  clumsy  cart  rolled  to  field  on  stout  iron-bound  discs 
of  wood  that  did  duty  as  wheels.  The  only  breaks  in  the  dull 
round  of  hard  labor  were  the  services  on  Sundays  and  saints' 
days,  and  for  the  favored  few  a  visit  to  the  annual  fair  at  a 
distant  town.  The  church  was  the  centre  and  light  of  village 
life  in  those  days.  It  was  often  fortified,  especially  if  it  were 
by  the  sea  and  in  danger  from  freebooters;  to  its  massive 
square  tower  the  people  ran  for  refuge,  carrying  their  little 
property  of  value,  when  threatened  with  danger.  The  conse- 
cration of  a  church  was  the  event  of  a  lifetime ;  then  the 
bishop  came  with  his  clergy,  marched  in  procession  round  the 
building,  bade  the  doors  be  opened,  entered,  sprinkled  holy 
water  about,  blessed  the  corners  of  the  church,  and  then  the 
altar,  on  which  twelve  candles  shone,  chanted  the  litany,  — 
and  then  the  people,  who  had  been  waiting  without,  were 
admitted  to  see  the  rest  of  the  ceremony.  In  like  manner 
grave-yards  were  consecrated,  the  four  corners  blessed,  and 
crosses  set  up.  The  bell  that  was  to  call  the  village  to 
service  was  washed,  named,  and  blessed  against  lightning  and 
evil  spirits. 

The  church's  watchful  care  encompassed  every  individual 
from  the  cradle  to  the  grave,  supporting  him  at  the  great  crises 
of  his  life,  and  hallowing  them  ;  receiving  him,  an  infant,  at 
baptism,  confirming  him  at  the  age  of  puberty,  applying  for 
every  spiritual  ailment  the  antidote  of  penance,  nourishing 
him  with  the  Eucharist,  solemnizing  his  marriage,  smoothing 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  65 

his  passage  to  another  world  with  extreme  unction  and  the 
viaticum. 

Unless  one  apprehends  such  facts  as  these  genially,  without 
prejudice  or  contempt,  it  is  not  for  him  to  understand  or  enjoy 
the  culture  of  that  age. 

It  is  estimated  that  in  the  fourteenth  century  the  population 
of  England  amounted  to  as  many  as  two  million,  five  hundred 
thousand  souls,  of  whom  at  least  two  hundred  thousand  were 
gathered  in  the  towns.  London  numbered  about  forty  thou- 
sand ;  Norwich,  the  second  city  in  the  kingdom,  perhaps  a 
third  as  many;  then  came  York  and  Bristol,  with  about  ten 
thousand  each.  The  streets  of  the  cities  were  narrow,  the 
houses  low.  In  London,  an  ancient  ordinance  required  that 
the  buildings  should  be  of  stone ;  there,  at  the  time  of  which 
we  treat,  gabled  upper  stories  were  beginning  to  appear,  pro- 
jecting so  boldly  that  they  almost  met  above  the  narrow  streets. 
The  rooms  on  the  ground  floor  were  then  commonly  converted 
into  shops.  Chimneys  and  glazed  windows  were  becoming 
general  in  the  houses  of  the  well-to-do,  behind  which  often 
pleasant  gardens  stretched.  More  than  half  the  land  of  Lon- 
don was  in  the  hands  of  ecclesiastics ;  fine  monasteries  like 
those  of  the  Black  and  Gray  Friars  gave  character  to  the  city. 
Over  all  the  world-famous  spire  of  St.  Paul's  shot  into  the  air 
to  a  height  of  nearly  five  hundred  feet:  its  dedication,  in  the 
year  1315,  signalized  the  completion  of  the  old  cathedral,  after 
a  century  of  reconstruction  and  addition.  The  vast  building, 
with  its  cloisters,  chapter-house,  and  episcopal  palace  adjoining, 
enclosed  a  wide  square,  in  the  middle  of  which  rose  a  large 
cross  of  sculptured  stone.  In  a  neighboring  row,  manuscripts, 
pictures,  and  rosaries  were  sold.  A  single  bridge  —  old  Lon- 
don bridge  —  spanned  the  river  Thames ;  it  was  lined,  like  a 
street,  with  houses  on  either  side.  From  Southwark  the  tide 
of  pilgrimage,  travel  and  traffic  set  toward  Kent,  and  all  the 
counties  that  bordered  on  the  English  channel. 


66  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

Living  was  plain  and  poor  in  those  days,  and  throughout  the 
winter  absolutely  unwholesome,  for  owing  to  lack  of  provender 
for  that  season  vast  droves  of  cattle  had  to  be  killed  in  Novem- 
ber, and  on  their  salted  meat  people  lived  for  more  than  half  the 
year.  The  salt  used  was  made  by  evaporation,  and  was  dark  in 
color  and  poor  in  quality.  In  Lent,  of  course,  salt  fish  was  the 
only  fare.  As  the  supply  of  vegetables  was  quite  insufficient  to 
correct  the  ill  effects  of  so  unwholesome  a  diet,  it  is  no  wonder 
that  the  people  of  England  were  plagued  with  scurvy  in  those 
long  winters.  An  immediate  result  of  so  much  salt  fare  was 
intolerable  thirst ;  vast  quantities  of  ale  and  small  beer  were 
required  to  quench  it.  The  tables  of  the  rich  were  supplied 
with  Gascon  wine. 

Such,  in  brief,  was  the  world  into  which  Chaucer  and  Gower, 
Langland  and  Wyclif  were  born. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  67 


IV. 

THE  office  of  Edward  Ill's  reign  was  to  fill  with  feeling, 
and  thereby  modify  the  intellectual  forms  of  the  time  of  Ed- 
ward I.  It  was  an  era  of  sentiment,  of  a  fresri  stir  of  the  affec- 
tions, of  freer  fancy  and  humor,  of  a  new  pathos.  This  it  is 
that  makes  it  so  attractive  to  the  student  of  history ;  the  soul 
feels  more  at  home  in  it  than  in  any  preceding  age. 

The  settled  participation  of  the  people  in  the  government  of 
the  country  begot  an  interest  in  the  common  welfare  and  a 
sense  of  national  unity  and  glory  that  were  more  genial  and 
general  than  before.  In  theology,  a  further  departure  was 
made  from  the  scholastic  method  which  heralded  the  dissolu- 
tion of  the  system :  the  logical  proofs  of  church  doctrines  that 
were  employed  in  preceding  ages  were  abandoned  as  inade- 
quate; the  reason  was  declared  to  be  ineffectual  in  the  sphere 
of  the  supernatural ;  and  faith  was  proclaimed  as  the  only  or- 
gan for  apprehending  spiritual  truths.  From  such  an  attitude 
diverse  consequences  sprang  :  among  pious  souls  a  more  ardent 
devotion  was  stimulated,  a  warmer  coloring  was  cast  over  re- 
ligion, and  it  became  a  matter  of  feeling;  while  the  stirring 
intellect  of  the  time,  gladly  relinquishing  all  spiritual  concerns 
to  the  direction  of  an  external  authority,  exercised  itself  in  the 
sphere  that  was  left  to  it  of  the  secular  and  the  human,  and 
revelled  in  the  glory  of  nature  and  the  treasures  of  classic  lit- 
erature. In  architecture,  the  chaste  forms  of  the  last  age 
were  moulded  into  mild  curves  of  excessive  elegance  and  grace 
that  bear  the  impress  of  the  refinement,  sentiment,  and  fancy 
of  the  new  epoch.  The  choirs  of  the  cathedrals  of  Lichfield, 
Ely,  and  Wells  are  examples  of  this  Decorated  style  ;  but  the 
acme  of  flowing  tracery  (seeming  in  this  case  to  copy  the  deli- 


68  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

cate  curves  of  leaves  and  flower-buds)  was  attained  in  the  east 
window  of  the  cathedral  of  Carlisle.  And  now  at  last  the 
spirit  of  the  age  found  a  tongue,  and  in  the  young  Chaucer's 
liquid  lines,  his  "  ditties  and  glad  songs  "  (which  sparkled,  we 
may  be  sure,  with  dew  and  sunshine),  his  "  Court  of  Love," 
"  Complaint  to  Pity,"  and  "  Complaint  of  Mars,"  warbled  forth 
the  exultant  joy  in  existence,  the  delight  in  springtime,  in  the 
fragrance  and  beauty  of  flowers,  and  the  song  of  birds,  the  bliss 
of  happy  love,  the  woe  of  unrequited  love,  that  were  the  prod- 
uct of  this  new  birth  of  the  soul.  Chaucer's  first  literary  work 
(significant  of  the  French  influence  that  dominated  all  his  early 
poems)  was  a  translation  of  the  "  Romance  of  the  Rose."  He 
also  translated  from  the  French  a  prayer  to  Mary,  in  which  the 
thought  of  the  tender  compassion  of  the  Virgin  Mother  rouses 
in  the*  poet's  heart  the  very  abandonment  of  love  and  passion- 
ate entreaty.  He  flees  to  her,  he  has  no  comfort  except  in  her, 
the  queen  of  misericord,  the  cause  of  grace.  In  her  is  abound- 
ing pity  ;  she  has  ruth  on  our  adversity.  This  word  ruth  is 
most  characteristic  of  Chaucer  of  any  in  his  vocabulary ;  it  is 
his  own  abounding  sympathy,  his  broad  humanity,  that  has  so 
endeared  him  to  every  later  age.  This  quality  gave  him  access 
to  the  hearts  of  his  characters,  and  his  mastery  of  language 
enabled  him  to  tell  their  secrets  to  others.  The  woes  of  myth- 
ological personages  even  were  real  to  him  ;  his  beautiful  lament 
for  the  Duchess  Blanche  of  Lancaster  opens,  appropriately, 
with  the  sad  story  of  Alcyone,  and 

"  Truly  I  which  made  this  book 
Had  such  pity  and  such  ruth 
To  read  her  sorrow,  that,  by  my  troth, 
I  fared  the  worse  all  the  morrow 
And  after,  to  thinken  on  her  sorrow." 

In  the  same  poem,  the  inconsolable  grief  of  the  man  in  black 
(the  widowed  Duke)  —  an  impersonation  of  sorrow,  —  and  the 
poet's  sympathy  with  him,  are  affectingly  portrayed. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  69 

The  central  figure  in  this  epoch  of  feeling,  of  a  national 
enthusiasm  which  he  himself  did  much  to  create,  is  that  of  the 
spirited  young  king,  Edward  III.  He  stands  in  the  heart  of 
all  the  stir  and  glitter  of  that  day.  Enthroned  when  he  was 
only  fourteen  years  old,  he  wedded,  at  fifteen,  Philippa  of 
Hainault,  and  in  1330,  when  he  was  but  seventeen  years  of 
age,  became  the  father  of  a  son  who  is  known  to  history  as  the 
Black  Prince.  A  few  months  later  he  assumed  in  full  the  sov- 
ereign authority ;  sent  to  the  gibbet  the  worthless  Mortimer ; 
and  fairly  began  his  brilliant  reign.  In  1333,  his  victory  over 
the  Scots  at  Halidon  Hill  wiped  out  the  lingering  disgrace  of 
Bannockburn,  and  his  overlordship  of  Scotland  was  admitted 
by  the  king  whom  he  placed  upon  the  throne  of  that  country. 
In  1337,  in  his  resentment  at  the  assistance  afforded  by  Philip 
VI  of  France  to  the  refractory  Scots,  Edward  revived  his  claim 
to  the  French  crown  as  grandson  of  Philip  the  Fair ;  entered 
into  an  alliance  with  the  Flemings,  —  a  connection  that  had  an 
important  bearing  upon  the  industrial  development  of  England ; 
and  began  the  long  drama  of  the  Hundred  Years'  War.  The 
splendid  victory  of  the  English  fleet  off  Sluys,  in  the  year  1340, 
was  the  first  great  naval  battle  of  modern  times.  In  1346,  on 
the  field  of  Cre'cy,  King  Edward  defeated  a  French  army  three 
times  as  numerous  as  his.  The  following  year  he  reduced 
Calais.  At  Poitiers,  in  1356,  the  Black  Prince  overcame  and 
put  to  flight  a  host  that  outnumbered  his  as  five  or  six  to  one  ; 
took  the  French  king  captive,  carried  him  to  England,  and 
exhibited  him  in  courteous  triumph  in  the  streets  of  London. 
These  dazzling  victories  swelled  to  the  utmost  the  pride  of 
Englishmen  in  their  king  and  country,  and  greatly  diminished 
the  influence"  over  them,  before  so  potent,  of  the  French  lan- 
guage and  literature. 

Parallel  with  these  events  were  the  Statutes  of  Provisors  and 
Praemunire,  —  declarations  of  the  independence  of  the  English 
church.  The  papal  curia,  still  situated  at  Avignon,  was  quite 


70  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

under  French  control.  Those  statutes  forbade  papal  fore- 
stalling of  the  rights  of  chapters  and  patrons  by  appointing 
successors  to  living  incumbents,  and  declared  the  king's  court 
the  court  of  final  appeal,  threatening  with  outlawry  any  ecclesi- 
astic who  carried  his  case  to  the  curia  for  settlement. 

King  Edward  enhanced  the  lustre  of  his  monarchy  by  intro- 
ducing, for  princes  of  the  blood  royal,  an  order  of  nobility  ele- 
vated above  the  ancient  orders,  —  that  is,  the  dukedom.  He 
created  the  Prince  of  Wales,  while  yet  a  young  child,  Duke  of 
Cornwall,  and  soon  after  made  his  cousin  Henry  Duke  of  Lan- 
caster. But  it  was  the  institution  of  the  Order  of  the  Garter 
that  sums  up  for  us  picturesquely  and  completely  the  magnifi- 
cent qualities  of  his  reign.  With  it  was  connected  the  rebuild- 
ing of  Windsor  castle,  —  a  truly  national  work,  in  which 
laborers  from  every  shire  in  England  cooperated,  —  and  both 
confess  the  magic  power  of  Arthurian  romance.  A  Round 
Table  was  set  up  in  the  Round  Tower  at  Windsor ;  knights 
and  noblemen  from  far  and  near  contended  in  splendid  tourna- 
ments ;  twenty-five  of  the  bravest  were  decorated  with  the 
insignia  of  the  order ;  and  song  and  feasting  concluded 
the  day. 

Edward  was  interested  in  the  intellectual  culture  of  his  young 
subjects  :  at  Cambridge,  where  Clare  Hall  had  lately  been 
founded,  he  founded,  in  1332,  King's  Hall,  or  College.  About 
the  same  time,  Oriel  and  Queen's  Colleges  were  instituted  at 
Oxford,  the  latter  in  honor  of  Queen  Philippa.  These  founda- 
tions are  to  be  compared  with  the  universities  that  were  rising 
at  the  same  period  in  the  large  towns  of  southern  Europe. 

There  was  no  noted  man  of  science  in  this  reign,  if  we  ex- 
cept John  Ardern,  the  first  celebrated  English  surgeon,  —  and 
he  was  not  as  eminent  as  his  French  contemporary,  Guy  de 
Chauliac,  physician  to  several  of  the  Avignonese  popes.  Ar- 
dern began  his  study  of  the  human  frame  at  the  time  when  the 
Black  Death  was  devastating  Europe;  after  the  year  1370  he 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  71 

had  a  flourishing  practice  in  London,  where  he  attended  the 
Black  Prince  and  the  chief  of  the  nobility. 

When  we  turn  to  the  literature  of  the  reign  we  catch  at  first, 
to  our  surprise,  echoes  of  the  lugubrious  strains  of  the  time  of 
Henry  III.  It  is  as  if  a  fountain  of  bitter  water  had  flowed 
underground  for  a  hundred  years  to  well  up  darkly  amid  the 
sunshine  of  a  happier  age.  This  sense  of  incongruity  is 
lessened  when  we  consider  that  the  writers  of  the  beginning  of 
Edward  Ill's  reign  were  reared  in  the  midst  of  the  fierce 
antagonisms  of  his  father's  time,  and  voice  its  tragic  spirit. 
It  is  apparent,  moreover,  that  a  deeper  religious  sentiment  was 
abroad  than  in  the  period  immediately  preceding. 

An  excellent  illustration  of  this  is  afforded  by  the  following 
sentence,  out  of  a  work  translated  from  the  French  by  Michel 
of  Northgate,  Kent,  in  the  year  1340  :  "If  thou  wilt  know 
what  is  good  and  what  is  evil,  go  out  of  thyself,  go  out  of  the 
world,  learn  to  die,  part  thy  soul  from  the  body  by  thought, 
send  thine  heart  into  the  other  world  (that  is,  into  heaven,  hell, 
and  purgatory)  —  there  thou  shalt  see  what  is  good  and  what 
is  evil."  The  work  of  which  this  dualistic  effort  is  the  key- 
note goes  by  the  name  of  "  The  Ayenbite  of  Inwyt "  (Again- 
biting  of  the  Inner-wit,  or  Remorse  of  Conscience).  It  is  writ- 
ten in  the  uncouth  Kentish  dialect.  It  is  an  exhaustive  classi- 
fication and  description,  with  divisions  and  sub-divisions  quite 
in  the  manner  of  a  philosophic  treatise,  of  the  seven  deadly 
sins  and  the  virtues  that  correct  them. 

Michel's  injunction  above  quoted  was  followed  to  the  letter 
by  his  contemporary,  Richard  Rolle,  hermit  of  Hampole,  near 
Doncaster,  Yorkshire,  who  died  in  the  year  1349.  He  wrote, 
in  the  Northern  dialect,  a  dreary  yet  interesting  poem,  "The 
Prick  of  Conscience,"  in  which  he  expatiates,  with  infinite 
detail,  upon  the  misery  of  man's  life.  Every  period  of  it,  he 
says,  contains  mickle  wretchedness ;  as  soon  as  a  child  is  born 
it  begins  to  cry ;  it  is  pitifully  feeble,  and  until  it  is  baptized 


72  OUTLINE    OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

is  the  fiend's  son ;  even  if  it  lives  to  grow  up  a  stalwart  and 
comely  young  man,  evils  of  all  sorts,  fever,  dropsy,  jaundice, 
phthisic,  gout,  and  other  maladies  will  cause  his  strength  to 
abate,  his  beauty  to  fade ;  then  comes  doting  old  age,  heavy  of 
heart  and  head,  dim  of  sight,  hard  of  hearing,  short  of  mem- 
ory, —  and  then  death,  whose  tokens  are  remorselessly  de- 
scribed ;  nor  is  the  poet  content  to  leave  the  grewsome  theme 
until  he  has  harrowed  our  feelings  to  the  uttermost  by  unveil- 
ing the  horrors  of  the  charnel-house.  He  enlarges  next  upon 
the  uncertainty  of  life ;  the  world  is  unstable,  as  variable  as  the 
sea,  as  full  of  danger  as  a  wilderness  haunted  by  wild  beasts  or 
a  forest  full  of  thieves  and  outlaws ;  man's  life  is  a  series  of 
chances  and  changes ;  Dame  Fortune  turns  her  wheel,  and 
while  she  lifts  some  from  woe  to  weal,  plunges  others  from  weal 
to  woe.  Fascinated,  like  an  Egyptian  of  old,  by  the  thought  of 
death,  the  hermit-poet  turns  to  it  again  to  dilate  upon  its  physi- 
cal and  spiritual  terrors  ;  he  enumerates  four  reasons  why  death 
is  to  be  dreaded  :  the  pain  of  the  parting  of  soul  and  body  ;  the 
vision  of  devils  about  the  death-bed ;  the  account  of  his  life 
that  the  sufferer  must  shortly  give ;  and  his  uncertainty  whether 
he  is  passing  to  joy  or  pain.  As  to  the  first  point,  a  figure  em- 
ployed by  a  "  philosopher  "  is  quoted  with  approval ;  suppose 
a  tree  planted  in  a  man's  heart,  its  roots  twisted  about  every 
joint  and  vein  in  his  body,  its  top  shooting  out  of  his  mouth, 
and  then  suppose  that  that  tree,  with  all  its  roots,  were  sud- 
denly pulled  out,  —  the  pain  would  be  like,  yet  not  so  fearful  as 
that  of  the  parting  of  soul  and  body.  The  next  portion  of  the 
work  treats  of  Purgatory  (its  least  pain  being  greater  than  the 
greatest  pain  of  earth ;  a  spark  only  of  its  fires  being  hotter 
than  all  the  fires  of  earth),  —  the  next  of  Doomsday,  —  and  the 
last  of  the  Pains  of  Hell  and  the  Joys  of  Heaven.  Some  of 
the  pains  of  hell  are  Dantesque  and  terrific  ;  there  men  suffer 
such  hunger  that  they  tear  their  own  flesh ;  they  thirst,  and 
have  only  fire  to  drink ;  they  are  tortured  by  conscience,  and 
by  devils  whose  aspect  woulfl  drive  men  mad  for  fear. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  73 

Violent  as  the  contrast  seems  to  be  between  this  dismal  poem 
with  its  lurid  touches  and  the  brilliant  reign  in  which  it  ap- 
peared, there  was  yet  a  fundamental  agreement  between  them, 
—  they  represented  the  two  poles  of  feeling.  The  hermit  of 
Hampole's  aim  was  emotional  coercion  ;  he  would  save  men 
by  exciting  to  an  agony  the  sentiment  of  fear. 

The  other  extreme  of  feeling,  that  of  desire  of  glory,  joy  in 
victory,  and  patriotic  pride,  was  voiced  by  Laurence  Minot, 
Edward  Ill's  rustic  laureate,  who  composed,  in  the  Northern 
dialect,  eleven  poems  that  celebrate  the  great  deeds  of  English- 
men and  their  "comely  King"  in  the  war  with  France  and 
Scotland.  The  ground  of  this  sentiment,  in  large  measure  the 
cause  of  those  triumphs,  was  a  conviction  that  God  was  on  the 
side  of  the  English  in  the  struggle,  and  that  he  regarded  their 
king  with  peculiar  favor.  Proof  of  this  is  quaintly  recorded 
by  Minot :  one  dull  morning,  when  the  spirit  of  the  English 
army  was  depresssed  by  a  thick  fog,  King  Edward  made  his 
prayer  to  God,  "  and  God  sent  him  good  comfort  soon,  —  the 
weather  grew  full  clear." 

All  through  this  period,  we  should  bear  in  mind,  miracle- 
plays  and  mysteries  were  enacted  in  due  season  before  eager 
crowds,  and  metrical  romances  were  as  popular  as  ever.  About 
the  middle  of  the  reign  a  French  romance,  "  William  of  Paler- 
mo," was  translated  into  the  midland  dialect,  in  alliterative 
verse.  It  is  a  tale  of  a  Sicilian  prince  who  was  kidnapped  by 
a  were-wolf,  found  by  a  shepherd,  and  finally  adopted  by  the 
emperor  of  Rome  ;  the  were-wolf,  who  was  in  reality  a  Spanish 
prince,  suffering  under  the  baleful  enchantment  of  his  wicked 
step-mother,  is  in  the  sequel  restored  to  his  right  shape,  and 
returns  to  his  native  land  to  reign.  It  is  a  pretty  story;  and 
the  best  descriptive  passages  it  contains  were  added  by  the 
English  translator.  More  interesting  yet,  because  smacking  of 
the  soil,  is  the  "Tale  of  Gamelyn  "  —  a  youth  who  is  abused 
and  betrayed  by  his  eldest  brother,  and  escapes  to  the  green- 


74  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

wood,  where  he  is  made  "king"  of  a  company  of  outlaws. 
His  story  is  evidently  connected  with  that  of  Robin  Hood. 
The  gathering  hatred  of  the  people  toward  the  regular  clergy 
is  strikingly  exhibited  in  this  poem.  The  best  of  all  these 
romances,  either  of  this  or  the  previous  period,  is  that  of  "  Sir 
Gawayne  and  the  Grene  Knight."  It  is  of  considerable  length. 
Each  section,  of  about  twenty  alliterative  lines,  is  pointed  with 
a  jaunty  quatrain.  Sir  Gawayne  is  King  Arthur's  nephew  ;  he 
is  a  paragon  of  knighthood,  an  exemplar  of  the  five  chivalric 
virtues,  frankness,  fellowship,  chastity,  courtesy,  and  pity  —  or 
sympathy.  The  scene  opens  with  the  Christmas  festivities  at 
Camelot ;  Guenore  the  queen  is  there  in  gay  apparel ;  after  the 
bounteous  feast  Arthur  calls  for  tales  of  marvel  and  adventure. 
On  a  sudden  a  giant,  as  green  as  grass,  appears  before  the 
court ;  his  beard  is  like  a  bush,  his  bristly  brows  are  green, 
and  "  all  his  vesture  verily  is  verdure."  He  is  seated  upon  a 
green  foal ;  his  saddle  is  embroidered  with  birds  and  flies,  his 
stirrups  set  with  green  stones.  He  holds  no  weapon  but  a 
holly-bough  and  axe  of  sharp  green  steel.  The  company  is 
daunted  by  this  singular  apparition,  who  dares  any  knight  there 
present  to  smite  him  on  the  neck  three  times  with  the  axe,  on 
condition  that  that  knight  shall  seek  him  out  a  year  from  that 
day  and  stand  as  many  strokes  in  his  turn.  Amid  the  fore- 
bodings of  the  ladies,  Sir  Gawayne  undertakes  the  adventure  : 
his  first  two  blows  are  ineffectual;  the  third  severs  the  Green 
Knight's  head  from  his  body ;  the  monster  catches  up  his  head 
and  gallops  away.  The  seasons  come  and  go,  but  no  thought 
of  escape  from  the  conditions  he  has  accepted  ever  enters 
Gawayne's  mind — to  a  knight  it  is  an  unspeakable  disgrace 
not  to  keep  his  faith.  The  warm  showers  fall,  the  trees  grow 
green,  the  birds  build  and  sing,  "  for  solace  of  the  soft  summer," 
the  "  donkand  dew "  drops  from  the  worts,  the  sun  is  bright 
and  hot,  the  wind  blows,  the  dust  drives,  the  leaves  fall,  the 
grass  grows  gray,  —  and  winter  winds  round.  It  is  time  for 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  75 

Gawayne  to  start  on  his  quest  for  the  Green  Knight.  First  he 
wanders  through  North  Wales,  and  in  the  winter  woodland 
meets  many  wonders,  —  but  none  can  tell  him  of  the  Green 
Knight.  At  Christmastide  he  arrives  at  a  fine  castle,  and  is 
courteously  entertained  there  three  days.  His  host  goes  hunt- 
ing, after  making  Gawayne  promise  that  he  will  return  him 
anything  that  may  be  given  him  in  his  absence.  The  descrip- 
tions of  the  arming  of  a  knight,  and  of  deer,  boar,  and  fox- 
hunting, are  given  with  spirit,  and  are  entertaining  episodes  in 
the  story.  Meanwhile  the  lady  of  the  castle  tempts  Gawayne ; 
it  is  a  difBcult  predicament, — he  must  be  courteous  to  the 
lady,  yet  not  a  traitor  to  his  host ;  he  withstands  her  entice- 
ments gracefully  and  honorably.  She  gives  him  a  magic  girdle 
to  protect  him  in  his  encounter  with  the  Green  Knight,  whose 
haunt  (he  discovers)  is  not  far  away.  In  the  evening,  when-  his 
host  returns,  Gawayne  gives  him  his  lady's  kisses  —  but  says 
nothing  about  the  girdle.  The  next  morning,  he  sets  out  to 
fulfil  his  compact  with  the  giant.  It  is  a  wild  winter's  day ; 
the  north  wind  blows,  the  "  snittering  "  snow  drifts  in  the  dales, 
every  hill  has  a  hat  and  cloak  of  mist.  At  last  he  comes  to  a 
cave,  overgrown  with  herbs  ;  it  is  the  green  chapel  of  the  giant, 
—  an  "  ugly  oratory,  where  devil-wise  devotions  might  well  be 
paid  ;  a  cursed  kirk  !  "  Out  of  a  hole  in  the  ground  comes  the 
Green  Knight,  —  his  host  of  the  castle,  though  he  knows  it  not. 
Gawayne  bares  his  neck  for  the  blows ;  the  first  two  are  only 
feigned  ;  the  third  time  the  axe  just  cuts  his  skin.  Then  the 
Green  Knight  tells  him  he  has  borne  himself  well  save  in  the 
matter  of  the  girdle :  the  third  stroke  was  his  punishment  for 
that  little  blemish  upon  his  honor.  Gawayne  is  deeply  humili- 
ated, and  curses  his  cowardice  and  untruth. 

As  we  read,  we  feel  instinctively  that  the  figures  of  this  story 
have  a  hidden  meaning,  and  we  are  justified  in  seeking  it  by 
the  known  passion  of  the  Middle  Ages  for  allegory.  What 
is  the  Green  Knight  but  a  type  of  nature,  —  not  the  inanimate 


76  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

world,  but  the  deathless  life  that  is  in  nature  ?  Then  the 
teaching  of  the  tale  is  that  that  Protean  life  can  only  be  con- 
quered and  made  harmless,  even  friendly,  by  perfect  self-con- 
trol and  the  strength  and  fearlessness  that  spring  from  purity 
and  good  faith. 

The  most  popular  book  of  the  age,  and  an  important  monu- 
ment of  early  English  prose,  was  Sir  John  Mandeville's  story 
of  travel  in  the  Orient.  Sir  John  left  England  in  the  year  1322, 
and  was  gone  for  more  than  thirty  years.  Upon  his  return 
from  the  East,  he  submitted  a  Latin  version  of  his  narrative  to 
the  pope  at  Avignon  ;  having  gained  his  approval  of  it  he 
translated  it  into  English,  in  1356.  His  motive  in  composing 
the  book  was  to  afford  pilgrims  a  guide  to  Jerusalem  and  the 
Holy  Land.  So  he  points  out,  in  the  first  part,  four  ways  to 
the  holy  city:  one  by  Cyprus  and  Jaffa,  another  by  Tyre,  an- 
other northward  from  Egypt,  another,  almost  entirely  by  land, 
through  Constantinople  and  Antioch.  In  the  second  part  he 
takes  a  wider  range;  traverses  Armenia,  the  land  of  Job,  India, 
Java,  and  Cathay ;  describes  the  gardens,  palace  and  throne  of 
the  Grand  Khan,  and  the  customs  of  the  Tartars;  and  then 
tells  of  Media,  Georgia,  and  the  Land  of  Darkness ;  of  twenty- 
two  kings  pent  up  between  the  mountains  and  the  Caspian  Sea, 
who  will  break  forth  in  Anti-Christ's  time;  of  the  dominion  of 
Prester  John  and  his  palace  at  Susa;  of  the  Vale  Perilous,  the 
Devil's  Head,  and  the  isles  of  Bragman  and  Taprobane. 
Though  some  of  Mandeville's  geography  seems  to  be  of  fairy- 
land, and  though  he  records  marvels  prodigious  enough  to 
satisfy  even  the  eager  craving  of  that  childlike  day,  yet  that 
very  interest  in  geography  and  the  doings  of  strange  folk  in 
far-off  lands  was  at  once  a  sign  and  a  means  of  a  remarkable 
intellectual  and  imaginative  awakening,  and  the  many  manu- 
scripts of  the  work  show  how  general  that  awakening  was. 
One  notable  trait  of  Mandeville's  is  the  interest  and  subtle 
sympathy  born  thereof  with  which  he  describes  the  religious 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  77 

beliefs  of  various  peoples,  the  strange  ways  of  the  Greek  and 
Syrian  Christians,  the  belief  of  the  Saracens  and  of  the  Fire- 
worshippers.  He  actually  speaks  in  that  day  of  the  Inquisi- 
tion, of  the  "  Holy  book  Alkoran,  which  God  sent  by  his 
messenger  Mohammed,"-—  a  dangerously  liberal  sentiment ! 

Such  was  the  literature  produced  in  England  while  Chaucer 
was  a  boy.  Meantime,  in  Germany,  William  of  Occam,  an 
Englishman,  who  had  already  drawn  the  last  conclusion  from 
that  theological  nescience  on  which  Duns  Scotus  had  lately 
insisted,  was  defending,  under  the  protection  of  the  Emperor 
Louis  IV,  and  in  his  behalf,  the  rights  of  the  civil  power  as 
against  papal  autocracy.  It  was  not  by  any  means  by  chance 
that  the  flourishing  period  of  German  mysticism  in  the  Rhine 
valley,  at  Constance,  Basel,  Strassburg  and  Cologne,  coincided 
with  Occam's  career,  —  that  Eckhart,  Tauler,  Suso,  and  the 
author  of  the  "  German  Theology "  were  his  contemporaries. 
Scholasticism  was  dissolved  into  mysticism  through  the  medium 
of  feeling, — by  the  doctrine  of  intuitive  apprehension  of  the 
being  of  God  and  of  all  spiritual  truths.  In  matters  of  faith, 
moreover,  both  yielded  unqualified  submission  to  the  authority 
of  the  church. 

In  the  year  1362,  a  priest  of  Strassburg  named  Closener 
finished  his  German  prose  chronicle  of  his  own  time.  The 
most  remarkable  passages  in  it  are  those  descriptive  of  the 
Black  Death,  and  the  emotional  extravagances  (connected  with 
it)  of  the  Flagellants.  The  whole  of  the  fourteenth  century 
was  prolific  in  the  homely,  mechanic  verse  of  the  Master- 
singers. 

The  rise  of  sentiment  in  that  century  was  signalized  by  a 
revival  of  poetry  in  the  South  ,of  France.  A  court  of  love  was 
instituted  at  Toulouse,  and  on  the  first  of  May,  1324,  a  golden 
violet  was  awarded  to  the  author  of  the  best  poem  in  the  Pro- 
vencal dialect.  This  was  the  occasion  of  the  Floral  Games, 
and  of  a  renewed  flourish  of  the  "Gay  Science."  In  1355, 


78  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

second  and  third  prizes  were  awarded,  —  a  silver  eglantine,  or 
flower  of  jasmine,  and  an  acacia-blossom  to  the  author  of  the 
best  ballad.  And  now,  in  the  north,  the  young  Froissart  was 
meditating  the  first  part  of  his  chronicle  of  the  gorgeous  spec- 
tacles, the  splendid  feasts,  and  all  the  pride,  pomp,  and  circum- 
stances of  the  glorious  wars  of  his  day.  By  this  time,  too,  the 
wave  of  enthusiasm  for  classic  culture,  propagated  by  Petrarch, 
had  reached  northern  France,  and  Nicholas  d'Oresme,  a  canon 
of  Rouen,  said  to  be  the  most  learned  Frenchman  of  his  day, 
headed  a  revival  of  letters,  in  the  course  of  which  translations 
into  the  vernacular  were  made  of  works  of  Caesar,  Sallust  and 
Cicero,  Livy,  Ovid,  Valerius  Maximus,  and  Lucan,  and  of  the 
Latin  version  of  works  by  Xenophon  and  Aristotle. 

A  delightful  collection  of  tales  that  deserve  to  be  better 
known  than  they  are  was  composed  in  Spanish  prose  by  Don 
Juan  Manuel  under  the  title  "El  Conde  Lucanor."  The  tales 
purport  to  be  a  wise  counsellor's  answers  to  the  Conde's 
questions  concerning  the  conduct  of  life.  Witty  and  wanton 
stories,  parodies  of  hymns,  and  a  satire  on  the  papal  court  for 
its  luxury  and  greed  of  gold,  were  written  in  Spanish  verse  by 
a  daring  priest,  Juan  Ruiz  de  Hita.  It  is  no  wonder  that  he 
languished,  for  the  last  thirteen  years  of  his  life,  in  the  prisons 
of  the  archbishop  of  Toledo.  The  history  of  Don  Juan's 
young  relative,  King  Alfonso  XI  of  Castile,  bears  comparison 
in  brilliancy,  movement,  and  romantic  coloring  with  that  of 
Edward  III.  Alfonso  founded  in  the  year  1332  the  short-lived 
Order  of  the  Belt,  which  very  probably  suggested  the  institu- 
tion of  the  Order  of  the  Garter.  Edward  admired  his  young 
Castilian  contemporary  exceedingly,  sought  an  alliance  of  their 
houses,  sent  him  aid  during  the  siege  of  Algeciras.  Alfonso's 
love  for  the  beautiful  Leonora  de  Guzman,  and  the  ill-fated 
passion  of  Pedro,  prince  of  Portugal,  for  the  yet  lovelier  Inez 
de  Castro,  make  this  the  most  romantic  era  in  the  history  of 
the  peninsula:  and  its  enthusiastic  and  often  irregular  loves, 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  79 

its  melting  sentiment,  martial  daring  and  adventurous  spirit  are 
all  enshrined  in  a  work  of  pure  imagination,  the  vast  romance 
of  Amadis  of  Gaul. 

To  Italy,  alive  with  the  inspiration  of  Dante's  genius,  the 
literary  supremacy  of  the  fourteenth  century  unquestionably 
belonged;  and  the  name  of  Andrea  Orcagna,  goldsmith,  pain- 
ter, sculptor,  and  architect,  a  contemporary  of  Petrarch  and 
Boccaccio,  reminds  us  that  her  preeminence  in  the  arts  was  yet 
more  absolute.  Taddeo  Gaddi,  a  pupil  of  Giotto,  emulated  his 
master  in  some  frescoes  in  the  church  of  Sto  Croce,  Florence, 
illustrative  of  scenes  in  the  life  of  the  Virgin ;  and  to  her 
Petrarch  addressed  a  fervent  hymn.  That  exquisite  poet  re- 
fined the  Italian  language,  and  gave  it  flexibility,  elegance,  and 
grace.  His  sonnets  to  Laura  are,  many  of  them,  antithetical, 
ingenious,  studied,  —  but  some,  especially  of  those  written  after 
her  death,  are  instinct  with  a  tender  and  exquisite  sentiment 
that  bathes  even  hills,  woods,  and  waters  in  its  pensive  light. 
Thus  Petrarch  became  the  clearest  spokesman  of  that  age  of 
feeling.  Sentiment  like  his,  moreover,  is  one  of  the  mightiest 
agents  in  self-knowledge  :  in  him  the  ideal  of  culture,  of  self- 
development  as  contrasted  with  the  monastic  ideal  of  self- 
repression,  came  once  for  all  into  full  relief.  His  very  name 
seems  to  shed  visible  radiance  over  the  whole  age.  After  his 
coronation  with  the  poet's  laurel  wreath  at  Rome,  in  the  year 
1341,  he  was  the  literary  dictator  of  Europe. 

At  the  same  time  Boccaccio  began  his  contributions  to 
Italian  literature.  He  had  already  composed  in  Latin  an 
erudite  work  on  the  genealogy  of  the  ancient  gods  which  bears 
witness  to  the  passion  for  antiquity  that  characterizes  every 
return  to  nature.  In  1341  he  visited  Naples,  and  became  the 
chief  ornament  of  the  gay  court  of  its  cultivated  but  dissolute 
queen.  There  he  wrote,  in  the  octave  stanza  that  he  made 
his  own,  a  diffuse  romantic  poem  intended  as  an  epic,  "La 
Teseide."  This  he  followed  with  the  "  Filostrato  " :  and  then 


80  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

taught  the  Italian  language  to  wind  and  flow  in  light  and  grace- 
ful prose  in  his  "  Decameron."  In  this  work  the  tales  of  the 
fourth  and  fifth  days — the  first  set  treating  of  unhappy,  the 
other  of  happy  love  and  successful  intrigue  —  strikingly  illus- 
trate the  range  of  sentiment  (albeit  in  this  case  somewhat 
artificial)  which  we  have  learned  to  associate  with  that  time. 
Tears,  smiles,  and  mocking  laughter  chased  each  other  in 
quick  succession  over  the  countenance  of  the  age. 

Among  Boccaccio's  most  admired  works  were  two,  written  in 
Latin,  on  the  sad  fortunes  of  illustrious  men  and  on  famous 
women.  Soon  after  his  return  from  Naples,  where  he  spent 
the  seven  best  years  of  his  life,  he  met  Petrarch,  and  the  two 
became  fast  friends.  One  of  Boccaccio's  chief  claims  to  dis- 
tinction is  that  he  stimulated  a  great  yearning  among  scholars 
to  learn  Greek. 

A  contemporary  of  his,  Giovanni  Villani,  the  historian  of 
Florence,  proved  by  his  work  that  Italian  was  a  fit  instrument 
for  historical  composition. 

Such,  in  brief,  was  Chaucer's  immediate  literary  background; 
and  with  him  English  literature  began  a  new  course.  Up  to 
this  time,  as  has  been  constantly  forced  upon  our  attention,  it 
was  at  best  but  a  dialect  literature,  provincial  and  narrow  in 
scope  and  interest ;  but  in  the  last  forty  years  of  the  fourteenth! 
century  the  Midland  dialect  became  the  English  language,  and 
writings  in  it  enjoyed  no  longer  a  merely  local  but  a  national 
popularity.  Henceforth  we  shall  have  occasion  to  mention 
the  Northern  and  Southern  forms  no  more,  save  as  the  former 
may  re-appear  under  a  new  name  as  the  Scottish  dialect,  —  the 
first  monument  of  which,  a  product  of  the  sturdy  struggle  for 
Scottish  independence,  was  honest  John  Barbour's  poem,  "  the 
Bruce."  Various  reasons  have  been  brought  forward  to  ac- 
count for  the  interesting  linguistic  development  just  mentioned: 
it  has  been  said  that  the  Midland  counties  exceeded  the  others 
in  extent,  wealth  and  populousness ;  that  in  them  were  situ- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  81 

ated  the  great  institutions  of  learning  at  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge ;  that  within  their  bounds  the  king  held  his  court ;  that 
the  language  of  the  midland  could  be  understood  by  men  from 
north  and  south  who  could  not  understand  each  other  ;  and 
finally,  that  Chaucer's  poems  and  Wyclif's  translation  of  the 
Bible  were  sufficient  of  themselves  to  raise  the  dialect  in  which 
they  appeared  into  a  commanding  position.  These  reasons 
serve  to  account  for  the  supremacy  of  the  Midland  dialect,  but 
a  deeper  cause  underlay  them  all  which  alone  satisfactorily 
explains  the  rise  in  importance  of  English  speech,  —  and  that 
was  the  elevation  of  English  sentiment  in  consequence  of  the 
splendid  successes  of  the  war  with  France.  An  interesting 
expression  of  it  was  an  act  of  parliament  of  the  year  1362,— 
two  years  after  the  treaty  of  Bretigny,  which  put  a  term  to  the 
first  period  of  the  Hundred  Years'  War,  —  which  required  that 
henceforth  in  the  courts  of  law  all  cases  should  be  pleaded, 
defended  and  judged  in  the  English  tongue,  "the  tongue  of  the 
realm,"  instead  of  in  French  as  before.  And  now,  at  this 
favorable  juncture,  a  great  master  arose  to  make  the  forming 
language  flow  in  verses  of  captivating  melody. 

Something  has  already  been  said,  by  way  of  anticipation,  of 
Chaucer's  character :  that  sympathy  which  was  then  empha- 
sized as  its  dominant  note  remained  with  him  through  life. 
Over  and  over  again  he  proclaims  his  poetic  creed,  that  a  truly 
noble  heart  is  quick  to  feel  and  show  compassion : 

"  For  pity  runneth  soon  in  gentle  heart." 

That  line  sums  up  his  observation  of  life,  and  that  we  may  not 
miss  its  import  he  repeats  it,  weaving  it  into  works  that  belong 
to  different  periods  of  his  career.  It  appears  first  in  the  pro- 
logue to  the  "  Legend  of  Good  Women,"  and  is  repeated  in  the 
tales  of  knight,  merchant,  and  squire.  In  the  man  of  law's 
tale  the  thought  is  otherwise  expressed :  "  a  gentle  heart  is  ful- 
filled of  pity."  In  the  same,  the  pathos  of  Constance's  story 
is  too  poignant  for  the  narrator  : 


82  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

"  I  may  not  tell  her  woe  until  to-morrow, 
I  am  so  weary  for  to  speak  of  sorrow." 

He  uses  the  felicitous  expression  "pitous  joye  "  to  suggest 
the  indescribably  affecting  blend  of  various  and  deep  emotions 
when  relatives,  long  parted,  meet  again.  That  gentle  and 
beautiful  relation  of  sympathy  between  human  beings,  that 
noble  and  refining  sentiment  of  which  true  courtesy  was  the 
expression,  was  admirably  suggested  by  the  word  mansuetude 
—  much  used  in  Chaucer's  time ;  it  is  a  pity  that  we  have 
lost  it. 

Chaucer's  love  of  nature  —  God's  "  vicar  general  "  —  is 
proved  by  innumerable  passages:  by  the  well-known  description 
of  his  romantic  homage  'to  the  daisy — "the  emperice  and 
floure  of  floures  alle"— :in  the  prologue  to  the  "Legend  of 
Good  Women  " ;  by  the  pretty  lines  in  the  knight's  tale  : 

"  The  busy  larke,  messager  of  claye, 
Salueth  in  hire  song  the  morwe  graye-, 
And  fyry  Phebus  ryseth  up  so  brighte 
That  al  the  orient  laugheth  of  the  lighte, 
And  with  his  stremes  dryeth  in  the  greves 
The  silver  dropes  hongyng  on  the  leeves  "  ; 

even  more  by  such  examples  of  delicate  observation  as  these 
(from  the  "Parliament  of  Fowls"  and  the  squire's  tale)  : 

"  Therwith  a  wynd  —  onethe  it  myght  be  lesse 

Made  in  the  levys  grene  a  noyse  softe 

Acordaunt  to  the  bryddis  song  alofte." 
"The  vapour,  which  that  fro  the  erthe  glood, 

Made  the  sonne  to  seme  rody  and  brood." 
"  Herkneth  these  blisful  briddes  how  they  synge, 

And  seth  the  f  ressche  floures  how  they  springe ; 

Ful  is  myn  hert  of  revel  and  solaas  "  - 

cries  Chanticleer,  in  the  nun's  priest's  tale. 

Chaucer  had  a  keen  eye  for  artistic  beauty:  in  the  second 
nun's  tale  occurs  this  stanza  of  pictorial  quality  as  distinct  as 
any  fresco  of  the  school  of  Giotto: 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  83 

Valerian  gooth  hoom,  and  fynt  Cecilie 
With-inne  his  chambre  with  an  angel  stonde ; 
This  angel  hadde  of  roses  and  of  lilie 
Corones  two,  the  which  he  bar  in  honde  ; 
And  first  to  Cecile,  as  I  understonde, 
He  yaf  that  oon,  and  after  gan  he  take 
That  other  to  Valerian,  hir  make." 

There  are  traces  in  other  works  of  his  of  an  art  more  advanced 
than  that  of  any  contemporary  Italian  artist,  —  for  Chaucer 
died  before  the  boy-painter  was  born  who  first  dared  to  depict 
the  unclad  human  form.  In  the  "  Parliament  of  Fowls  "  there 
is  a  picture  of  Venus  recumbent  on  a  golden  bed  :  her  golden 
hair  is  loose,  she  is  nude  to  the  waist,  her  limbs  are  covered 
with  thin  valence.  In  the  "  House  of  Fame  "  the  poet  dreams 
that  he  is  in  a  temple  of  glass,  and  among  statues  and  portrai- 
tures sees  a  figure  of  Venus  "naked  floating  in  a  see,"  a  garland 
of  red  and  white  roses  on  her  head,  and  doves  fluttering  around. 
Not  till  a  hundred  years  later  did  any  work  of  Italian  art 
appear  that  at  all  resembled  that  description. 

A  mythologic  touch  that  would  be  startling  were  it  not  naive, 
and  that  was  subtly  characteristic  of  the  Renascence,  occurs  in 
the  story  of  Dido,  who  was  so  fair  that  God  the  Creator  might 
take  her  for  his  love,  if  he  would  wed  a  mortal  woman.  It  can- 
not be  denied  that  this  is  paralleled  by  the  relation  conceived 
by  mediaeval  devotion  to  exist  between  the  Holy  Ghost  and 
the  Virgin  Mary :  there  is  a  bold  expression  of  it  in  the  prio- 
ress's prologue  to  her  tale. 

Chaucer's  journey  into  Italy  at  the  end  of  the  year  1372  was 
a  turning  point  in  his  literary  career.  He  went  in  King 
Edward's  service,  and  was  away  until  the  end  of  the  following 
year.  It  is  supposed  that  upon  that  visit  he  made  the  ac- 
quaintance of  Petrarch  :  it  is  certain  that  his  Clerk's  tale  was  a 
free  version  of  Petrarch's  Latin  translation  of  the  last  tale  in 
Boccaccio's  Decameron.  That  Italian  journey  put  a  term  to 
the  literary  influence  of  France  upon  his  spirit,  and  opened  its 


84  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

gates  to  the  more  potent  influence  of  the  great  authors  of  Italy. 
There  is  not  one  of  Boccaccio's  works  before  mentioned  to 
which  Chaucer  was  not  deeply  indebted.  His  stanza  is  but  a 
slight  modification  of  Boccaccio's  octave.  In  1378,  he  went  on 
another  embassy  to  Northern  Italy,  and  some  time  after  his 
return  composed  "  The  House  of  Fame,"  in  which  Dante's 
influence  is  plainly  apparent.  An  eagle  bears  the  poet  to  the 
echoing  palace  of  fame,  midway  between  heaven,  earth  and  sea. 
It  is  built  of  beryl,  and  stands  on  a  high  rock  of  ice  which  is 
written  all  over  with  famous  names,  the  least  known  of  which 
have  partly  melted  away.  In  the  splendid  hall  sits  the  goddess 
of  Fame  on  a  ruby  throne ;  on  pedestals  beside  her  'stand 
Statius,  Homer,  Virgil,  Ovid,  "the  great  poet  Dan  Lucan,"  and 
others.  This  idea  of  individual  glory,  this  hope  of  living  in  the 
memory  of  the  race,  was  a  salient  feature  of  Renascent  life  and 
thought :  men  longed  to  stand  well  in  others'  estimation,  to 
gain  their  approbation  by  brilliant  achievements.  That  desire 
arose  naturally  out  of  the  character  of  the  age :  it  was  simply 
a  longing  for  sympathy  raised  to  fever  heat.  It  was  a  highly 
important  agent  in  the  cultivation  of  individuality,  in  which  the 
broadest  and  deepest  distinction  between  mediaeval  and  mod- 
ern literature  consists.  Literature  proper  was  henceforth  no 
longer  to  be  provided  by  cowled  monks  whose  personality  was 
lost  in  their  profession,  or  by  wandering  and  nameless  min- 
strels. Chaucer's  personality  is  surprisingly  distinct  when  seen 
against  the  background  of  all  previous  English  literature ;  he 
was  in  truth  a  modern  man.  We  should  not  forget  to  mention 
as  a  significant  factor  in  his  intellectual  development,  his  trans- 
lation of  Boethius'  treatise  "  On  the  Consolation  of  Philosophy." 
By  the  year  1388,  Chaucer  had  worked  free  of  Italian  influ- 
ence, and  entered  upon  his  third,  last,  and  thoroughly  English 
period,  —  that  of  the  shaping  of  the  Canterbury  Tales.  To 
that  period  belong  the  inimitable  Prologue,  and  in  all  proba- 
bility, the  tales  of  miller,  reeve,  friar,  summoner,  etc.  — 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  85 

stories  of  broad  humor  and  coarse  satire  for  which  Chaucer 
himself  apologizes:  he  must  not  "falsen  his  mateere."  His 
own  "Rhyme  of  Sir  Thopas  "  —in  the  midst  of  which  he  is 
impatiently  interrupted  by  the  host  —  is  a  delicious  satire  on 
the  metrical  romances  still  in  vogue,  on  their  fantastic  charac- 
ters, motives,  and  incidents,  and  prosy  detail.  A  playful  piece 
like  that  is  worthy  of  attentive  reading  ;  it  is  an  evidence  of 
independent  thinking  such  as  generally  marks  the  boundary 
between  epochs  ;  it  is  the  criticism  of  a  new  age  on  that  which 
has  gone  before. 

The  Canterbury  Tales  comprise  a  veritable  world  of  thought 
and  feeling.  Scattered  through  them,  especially  the  later  ones, 
are  many  allusions  that  Help  us  to  reconstruct  with  tolerable 
completeness  the  domestic  life  of  Chaucer's  time.  The  frank- 
lin's tale  —  one  of  the  most  pleasing  of  all,  —  its  subject  bor- 
rowed from  Boccaccio,  —  opens  with  a  beautiful  description  of 
wedded  love  :  "  Love  is  a  thing  as  any  spirit  free."  The  wife 
of  Bath's  tale  (for  a  wonder)  concludes  in  the  same  strain  : 
yet  it  may  be  doubted  whether  Chaucer  had  such  a  lofty  idea 
of  marriage  as  some  of  his  critics,  deceived  by  the  seeming 
seriousness  of  certain  playful  passages,  have  declared  that  he 
had.  How  could  he  have  when  for  ages  after  his  day  the  tra- 
ditional view  of  marriage  as  a  declension  from  the  better  state 
of  celibacy  still  cumbered  the  ground  ?  —  when  he  could  write 
that  in  the  consummation  of  wedlock  a  woman  lays  half  her 
holiness  aside  ?  —  a  notion  that  poisoned  the  stream  of  domes- 
tic life  at  its  source.  It  is  true  that  he  says,  correctly  enough, 
that  "  marriage  is  a  full  great  sacrament  "  —  but  then  that  line, 
with  its  accompanying  (ironical)  praise  of  a  wife  occurs  in  the 
one  and  only  thoroughly  and  hopelessly  corrupt  tale  that  he 
ever  wrote.  In  the  parson's  sermon  is  a  rebuke  that  throws  a 
sad  light  upon  a  grave  and  only  too  common  wrong :  "  above 
all  things  men  ought  to  avoid  cursing  their  own  children,  and 
giving  their  offspring  to  the  devil :  surely  it  is  great  peril  and 


86  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

great  sin."  The  doctor  of  physic  cautions  parents  against 
negligence  in  chastising  their  children.  The  franklin  has  a 
son  whom  he  brings  up  on  the  vicious  though  common  princi- 
ple of  "snubbing,"  because  the  youth  is  not  as  virtuous  as  he 
should  be. 

It  seems  impossible  to  doubt  that  the  plan  of  the  Canterbury 
Tales  was  suggested  by  the  Decameron,  but  its  working  out 
was  entirely  independent  and  national  in  movement  and  color. 
Boccaccio's  story-tellers,  ten  in  number,  are  all  young  and  of 
the  same  station  in  life ;  they  meet  in  the  church  of  Santa 
Maria  Novella,  and  leave  the  plague-stricken  city  to  shut  them- 
selves from  their  suffering  kind  in  the  safe  seclusion  of  a  stately 
palace  amid  delicious  gardens  and  refreshing  fountains ;  there 
they  divert  their  minds  from  all  thought  of  the  misery  left  be- 
hind by  telling  tales  which,  as  we  have  seen,  tend  toward  classi- 
fication, —  one  set  dealing  with  happy,  another  with  unhappy 
love-affairs.  The  English  poet  gathers  thirty  people  together, 
of  all  ranks  and  ages,  and  of  the  most  varied  experience  of  life  ; 
they  meet  in  an  inn,  and  their  motive  is  a  genial  one  :  they  are 
pilgrims  to  the  shrine  of  St.  Thomas  of  Canterbury.  In  the 
morning  they  set  forth,  all  on  horseback,  and  pass  before  us 
in  a  gay  and  shifting  cavalcade ;  though  of  varying  degrees  of 
reverence  or  no  reverence,  their  common  motive,  and  the  free 
intercourse  of  travelling  acquaintanceship,  give  them  all  a 
pleasing  equality.  The  tales  they  tell  are  of  infinite  variety, 
and  are  adjusted  with  nice  art  to  their  several  characters. 

So  Chaucer  has  preserved  for  us  a  world  of  life  that  moves 
and  has  its  being  forever.  How  potent  the  spell  of  his  gently 
lapsing  verse! 

"  In  Surrye  whylom  dwelte  a  companye 
Of  chapmen  riche,  and  thereto  sadde  and  trewe, 
That  wyde-wher  senten  her  spicerye," 

yielding  to  the  current  the  reader  is  quickly  borne  over  the  tide 
of  years  to  that  far-off,  almost  ideal  time  when  Constantinople 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  87 

was  the  centre  of  the  world's  commerce,  and  the  precious 
stuffs  and  jewels  of  the  Orient,  brought  thence  in  Genoese  and 
Venetian  argosies,  were  distributed  over  Europe,  and  ex- 
changed in  the  ports  of  Bruges  and  London  for  the  produce  of 
northern  shores  scoured  by  the  fleets  of  the  Hanseatic  League  ; 
when  along  the  line  of  those  fertilizing  streams  of  trade  stately 
monuments  of  art  were  rising ;  when  the  Dukedom  of  Athens 
still  existed,  a  last  fragment  and  fading  memorial  of  the  Latin 
Empire  of  the  East ;  when  Genghis  Khan  and  his  sons  were  yet 
mighty  and  marvellous  figures  in  a  not  distant  past ;  when  bow, 
sword  and  buckler  had  not  yet  vanished  before  powder  and 
shot ;  when  English  knights  served  in  Lithuania  with  their 
Teutonic  brethren,  or  under  Castilian  banners  against  the  Moors 
of  Granada  or  sought  adventure  even  further  away,  in  Anatolia 
and  Armenia ;  when  dreamy  legends  of  saints  were  still 
devoutly  believed  ;  when  pilgrimages  to  Compostella  and  the 
Virgin's  house  at  Loreto  were  popular  ;  when  Rome  was  the 
religious  centre  of  Christendom,  and  her  emissaries  were 
omnipresent  and  numerous  as  the  motes  that  people  the  sun- 
beams. 


88  OUTLINE    OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 


V. 

IN  relation  to  his  times,  Chaucer  would  have  been  happier 
had  his  whole  career  been  set  back  ten  years  or  so:  he  lived  on 
into  an  era  of  discord,  folly  and  crime  in  which  his  spirit  must 
have  felt  belated  and  something  of  an  alien,  —  nor  can  he  have 
fully  understood  and  sympathized  with  the  moral  struggle  of 
those  troubled  years.  Even  his  early  manhood  had  been  dis- 
turbed by  jarring  cries, — the  cry  of  poor  against  rich,  of 
laborers  against  idlers,  of  earnest  men  against  worldly  church- 
men, and  worthless  monks  and  friars.  The  spokesman  of  this 
popular  discontent  was  William  Langland ;  his  allegorical, 
severely  didactic,  preaching  poem,  in  dialect  and  in  alliterative 
verse,  was  in  great  demand:  many  manuscripts  of  it  are  still  ex- 
tant. Langland  found  the  social  condition  of  the  England  of 
his  day  to  be  lamentably  unsound  ;  in  the  prologue  to  his  work 
he  passes  in  review  various  classes  intended  to  represent  the 
sum  of  English  society,  and  finds  that  in  the  mass  evil  vastly 
preponderates :  plowmen  labor  hard  to  produce  what  the  waste- 
ful scatter  in  gluttony  ;  the  proud  array  themselves  in  outward 
splendor  ;  jesters  —  "  Judas'  children  "  —make  fools  of  them- 
selves instead  of  working  as  they  might  ;  beggars  rove  about, 
getting  food  by  feints,  fighting  over  their  ale  —  greedy,  lazy 
ribalds! ;  pilgrims  and  palmers  seek  the  shrine  of  St.  James,  and 
saints  at  Rome,  —  and  have  leave  to  lie  all  their  lives  after  ; 
some  great  lubbers  that  are  loth  to  work  call  themselves  her- 
mits and  take  their  ease  ;  friars  of  all  the  four  orders  preach  for 
their  own  profit  and  glose  the  gospel  as  seems  good  to  them  ; 
pardoners  and  parish-priests  divide  the  people's  silver  ;  ser- 
geants at  law  plead  for  pence  and  pounds,  —  but  will  not  part 
their  lips  for  love  of  our  Lord  ;  bishops  bold  and  bachelors  of 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  89 

divinity  become  clerks  of  account,  to  serve  the  king  ;  deacons 
and  archdeacons,  instead  of  preaching  to  the  people,  "lope" 
to  London  to  plunder  the  country  as  clerks  of  King's  Bench  ; 
bakers,  butchers,  weavers,  tailors,  tanners,  masons,  ditchers 
and  delvers  do  their  work  badly ;  there  are  some  truly  pious 
people,  some  honest  merchants,  some  minstrels  who  get  guilt- 
less gold,  —  but  most  men  now  on  earth  have  their  honor  in 
this  world,  and  reck  not  of  any  other  heaven  than  here.  The 
body  of  the  poem  is  a  rambling  allegory  of  things  seen  in 
dreams  ;  a  lovely  lady,  Holy-church,  explains  their  meaning, 
and  preaches  about  truth  and  right ;  Flattery,  Falsehood,  and 
Meed  (this  world's  goods)  appear  on  the  scene  :  Meed  is  to  be 
married  to  Falsehood,  but  he  leaves  her  in  the  lurch  ;  the  king 
offers  her  to  Conscience,  but  he  rejects  her  with  horror,  and 
gives  a  catalogue  of  her  enormities.  In  the  next  dream  the 
deadly  sins  are  moved  to  confession,  and  go  in  search  of  St. 
Truth  ;  they  are  directed  on  their  allegorical  way  by  the  ideal 
personage  who  gives  his  name  to  the  work —  Piers  the  Plowman. 
In  following  visions  occur  interesting  and  affecting  descriptions 
of  the  hard  life,  improvidence,  and  sorrows  of  the  poor. 

Langland's  conviction  was  that  the  times  were  out  of  joint, 
but  could  be  set  right  if  only  the  rich  would  have  ruth  on  the 
poor,  and  if  every  man  would  work  diligently  at  his  calling, 
and  be  guided  by  right  reason,  common  sense,  and  conscience. 
This  appeal  to  conscience,  to  the  sense  of  duty,  is  of  deep 
significance  ;  it  means  that  the  mind  of  England  was  strug- 
gling to  reach  a  higher  moral  level  than  feeling  could  afford. 
Another  and  more  satisfactory  guide  of  life  was  being  sought 
for  in  the  midst  of  that  moral  confusion  into  which  mere  sen- 
timent must  ever  degenerate.  Into  such  confusion,  toward  the 
close  of  the  fourteenth  century,  England  and  the  world  at 
large  were  plunging;  a  light  shade  falls  over  the  face  of  his- 
tory at  this  point,  and  dims  the  brightness  of  the  First 
Renascence. 


90  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

The  treaty  of  Bretigny  was  soon  infringed  by  the  French 
king,  Charles  V ;  his  forces  made  serious  encroachments  upon 
Poitou  and  Guienne,  and  the  boundary-line  of  the  English 
possessions  in  France  began  steadily  and  rapidly  to  contract. 
The  Black  Prince  had  sadly  embarrassed  his  cause  by  his  ill- 
advised  interference  in  Spanish  affairs,  —  he  found  to  his  cost 
that  he  was  upon  the  wrong  side  in  the  struggle  for  the 
Castilian  crown.  He  achieved  his  last  famous  success  in  the 
recapture  of  the  city  of  Limoges,  in  1370,  and  sullied  it  by  an 
act  of  ungovernable  passion  which  has  left  an  ineffaceable 
stain  upon  his  memory :  the  town  had  revolted  from  him,  and 
in  the  fury  of  revenge  he  ordered  a  general  massacre  of  its 
inhabitants :  three  thousand  persons,  all  defenceless,  many  of 
them  innocent,  fell  victims  to  this  sanguinary  mandate. 

In  England,  King  Edward  III,  though  yet  in  middle  life, 
was  fast  declining  in  vigor  and  honor.  After  the  death  of  his 
faithful  queen  Philippa,  in  1369,  he  resigned  himself  completely 
to  the  influence  of  a  courtesan,  the  notorious  Alice  Pierce  :  the 
scandal  was  such  that  parliament  had  finally  to  bring  about  her 
removal  from  court.  In  1376  the  Black  Prince  died  ;  the  year 
after  the  king  followed  him  to  the  tomb  ;  and  the  Prince's  only 
surviving  son,  then  but  eleven  years  of  age,  acceded  to  the 
throne  as  Richard  II.  The  story  of  his  reign  is  a  depressing 
account  of  incapacity  and  misgovernment,  of  a  long  struggle 
for  power  between  the  dukes  his  uncles  and  the  king,  of  a 
series  of  crafty  and  vindictive  strokes  and  counterstrokes  of 
selfish  policy.  In  1381,  the  smouldering  discontent  of  the 
people  was  fanned  into  flame  by  the  imposition  of  a  hated  tax 
to  pay  the  costs  of  the  futile  war  with  France  ;  but  the  insur- 
rection was  soon  suppressed  and  its  leaders  were  put  to  death. 
In  1386,  the  French  collected  a  great  army  and  a  multitude  of 
ships  for  the  invasion  and  subjugation  of  England,  —  but  a 
storm  at  sea  and  divided  counsels  among  the  commanders 
brought  the  vast  enterprise  to  naught.  The  next  year,  King 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE. 

Richard,  restive  under  the  control  of  his  uncle  the  duke  of 
Gloucester,  and  swayed  entirely  by  the  influence  of  his  favorite, 
the  handsome  but  profligate  De  Vere,  obtained  from  the  sub- 
missive Chief  Justice,  Robert  Tresilian,  and  his  colleagues  a 
declaration  against  the  Duke's  attempt  to  minimize  the  royal 
authority.  This  scheme  failed  of  success  :  the  duke  and  his 
party  rose  in  arms,  De  Vere  fled  to  the  continent,  and  Tresil- 
ian, caught  hiding,  was  hung.  In  1389,  however,  Richard 
managed  to  secure  sovereign  power ;  but  an  unpopular  step 
which  he  took,  in  1396,  led  to  his  fall  :  he  made  peace  with 
Charles  VI  of  France  for  a  term  of  twenty-eight  years,  and 
took  to  wife  his  daughter  Isabella.  Trading  upon  the  general 
dislike  of  this  connection  in  England,  Gloucester  began  fresh 
intrigues,  which  were  foiled  by  a  stroke  of  kingcraft  :  he  was 
arrested  and  made  way  with,  and  his  chief  adherents  were  ex- 
ecuted or  banished.  Richard  now  plainly  revealed  the  temper 
of  a  tyrant,  and,  satisfied  that  he  had  crushed  all  opposition, 
he  shortly  crossed  over  into  Ireland  to  maintain  his  authority 
there.  But  while  he  was  away  his  cousin  Henry,  duke  of 
Lancaster,  whom  he  had  banished  from  the  realm  and  whose 
possessions  he  had  seized,  landed  in  England  and  speedily 
attracted  to  himself  a  numerous  following.  At  the  news, 
Richard  returned  precipitately,  and  found  himself  alone  in  his 
kingdom  :  he  was  taken  captive,  deposed,  removed  to  some 
secret  spot,  and  was  never  heard  of  more. 

It  was  in  the  midst  of  this  period  of  disintegration,  of  dis- 
solution of  family  and  social  ties,  while  the  political  pendulum 
oscillated  between  anarchy  and  tyranny,  that  a  great  and 
much  needed  appeal  to  Conscience  and  the  Bible  was  stren- 
uously and  resolutely  made  by  John  Wyclif  and  his  band  of 
"poor  priests."  This  reformatory  movement  originated  at 
Oxford:  Wyclif  first  appears  upon  the  scene  as  Warden  of 
Balliol  College.  About  the  year  1366  he  was  drawn  into  the 
current  of  political  life,  and  powerfully  defended  the  refusal  of 


92  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

the  English  government  to  pay  the  tribute  demanded  by  Pope 
Urban  V.  At  this  time  he  sketched  out  his  cardinal  doctrine 
of  Dominion,  that  all  authority  depends  upon  God's  favor. 
This  weapon  he  turned  against  the  papal  claims  :  like  a  sword 
with  double  edge  it  cut  right  and  left.  While  the  English 
people  obey  God,  he  said,  they  hold  directly  of  him  and  not 
mediately,  through  the  pope.  Thus  at  a  stroke  he  lopped  off 
both  the  temporal  and  the  spiritual  authority  of  the  pope  in 
England.  For  on  the  one  hand  he  gave  the  national  idea  a 
deeper  ground  than  had  been  recognized  since  Israelitish 
times  :  the  state,  he  said,  as  well  as  the  church  derives  its 
power  from  God  and  does  him  service  ;  and,  on  the  other 
hand,  by  insisting  upon  the  immediate,  personal  relation  of 
man  to  God,  that  as  man  sins  against  his  Maker  and  may  sin 
secretly  so  by  secret  repentance  and  confession  to  him  he 
may  obtain  forgiveness,  he  banished  all  intermediaries  between 
the  creature  and  the  creator,  levelled  the  celestial  and  terres- 
trial hierarchies,  and  revealed  the  emptiness  of  the  heavenly 
treasury  and  the  deceitfulness  of  indulgences.  Wyclif  would 
have  earnestly  exhorted  or  sternly  rebuked  the  Canterbury 
pilgrims  had  he  met  them  at  the  Tabard  inn  :  he  would  have 
shown  them  that  pilgrimage  was  no  sure  sign  of  genuine  con- 
trition or  means  of  grace.  His  was  a  ringing  appeal  to  the 
conscience  of  the  people.  "  Some  good  judgment,"  he  wrote, 
"is  of  men's  out-wits  [senses]  ;  some,  of  men's  wit  within,  as 
men  judge  how  they  shall  do  by  law  of  conscience."  "Men 
of  conscience  "  say  that  only  Christ  can  hear  shrifts.  When 
Wyclif  thought  of  man  he  took  it  for  granted  that  he  was 
free  in  choice  and  act  :  "  each  man  hath  a  free  will  and  choos- 
ing of  good  and  evil."  To  convert  that  will  to  righteousness 
was  the  motive  of  his  and  his  followers'  fervent  preaching,  and 
of  their  translation  of  the  Bible.  "  It  is  Antichrist,"  he  said, 
"  who  forbids  the  study  of  God's  word,  and  who  says  that 
preaching  is  useless  because  God  ordains  to  weal  or  woe." 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  93 

This  evangelical  activity  was  a  necessary  consequence  of  the 
doctrine  of  dominion  :  the  condition  by  which  the  English 
people  received  from  God  the  right  to  govern  themselves, 
without  interference  from  pope  or  emperor,  was  that  they 
should  serve  and  obey  him,  should  do  him  homage  (an  appli- 
cation of  the  feudal  principle)  :  they  lost  that  right  by  failure 
to  fulfil  the  condition,  by  disobedience  and  sin.  Hence  it  was 
imperatively  necessary  that  the  English  should  be  a  godly  peo- 
ple ;  to  that  end  it  was  necessary  that  they  should  know  the 
will  of  God  which  it  was  their  duty  to  obey ;  that  will  was 
embodied  in  the  Bible  :  that  therefore  they  must  thoroughly 
know  by  reading  and  exposition.  Wyclif  grasped  in  a  manner 
granted  to  few  in  the  world's  history  the  thought  of  God  as 
absolute  will  :  when  he  fixed  his  gaze  on  him  he  was  a  predes- 
tinarian.  He  held  together  the  doctrine  of  God's  uncondi- 
tioned sway  and  of  human  freedom,  and  felt,  perhaps  perceived 
that  there  was,  no  conflict  between  them. 

One  aspect  of  his  position  which  needs  further  illustration 
is  the  conflict  between  religious  authorities  that  it  occasioned. 
The  theory  of  theological  nescience  that  was  in  the  ascendant 
before  and  during  Wyclif's  day  left  it  to  faith  alone  to  appre- 
hend spiritual  truths, — but  faith  was  capable  of  mistaking 
temporal  errors  for  eternal  truths  ;  faith  bowed  unquestion- 
ingly  to  the  authority  of  the  church,  —  the  mystics  gave  it  an 
all  but  unqualified  submission  ;  and  opinions  and  institutions 
purely  human,  from  which  divine  efficacy  had  evaporated,  and 
which  were  becoming  noxious,  might  be  and  were  generally 
accepted  on  ecclesiastical  authority  as  divinely  revealed  dogmas 
and  polities.  Any  one  who  would  alter  anything  in  the  estab- 
lished order  of  things  must  seek  another  court  of  appeal,  — 
and  that  Wyclif  found  in  the  Bible.  There,  he  proclaimed, 
was  a  clear  expression  of  the  will  of  God,  with  which  the  con- 
fused and  changing  authority  of  the  church  might  and  often 
did  come  into  conflict.  For  many  years  that  antagonism  found 


94  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

daily  expression  in  the  controversies  between  the  friars  and  the 
"  poor  priests,"  or  preachers  whom  Wyclif  sent  out,  who  ere- 
long came  to  be  known  by  the  unexplained  but  evidently 
opprobrious  term  "  Lollards."  They  regularly  closed  their 
argument  by  an  appeal  to  "  God's  law,"  which  their  opponents 
as  regularly  attempted  to  offset  by  instancing  the  practice  of  the 
church.  The  inefficacy  of  this  latter  appeal,  and  the  farthest 
reach  of  intellectual  independence  in  that  day,  are  exemplified 
by  Wyclif's  naive  assertion  that  the  pope's  approval  of  a  thing 
indicates  that  it  is  probably  wrong  ! 

From  this  view  of  the  Bible  as  the  supreme  authority  in 
religious  matters  its  translation  into  the  vernacular  followed  as 
a  matter  of  course.  That  translation  was  in  its  best  sense  a 
popular  act ;  it  was  an  act  of  trust,  —  of  trust  in  the  intelli- 
gence of  the  people,  their  capacity  to  understand  the  book,  and 
in  their  moral  sense,  their  will  to  use  it  rightly.  Distrust  of 
these  was  then  and  for  ages  after  the  ground  of  all  objections 
to  such  translation  :  the  people  would  misconstrue  and  abuse 
the  teaching  of  the  book,  it  was  said.  To  this  suspicion  Wyclif 
opposed  a  firm  faith  in  the  good  sense  of  the  majority,  and  an 
argument  capable  of  infinite  application  :  he  could  not  deny 
that  some  might  abuse  their  liberty, — "but  should  food  be 
forbidden  to  all  because  some  are  gluttons  ? "  Against  his 
opponents  the  friars  he  adduced  the  example  of  Christ,  who 
taught  the  people  deepest  truths  in  their  mother-tongue  ;  the 
spirit,  moreover,  spoke  in  divers  tongues  on  the  day  of  Pente- 
cost ;  St.  Jerome  translated  the  Scriptures  out  of  the  original, 
sacred  languages  into  Latin ;  they  have  been  translated  into 
French ;  and  the  friars  themselves  teach  the  Lord's  Prayer  in 
English, — why  not  then  the  whole  Gospel?  "Englishmen 
know  Christ's  lore  and  life  best  in  their  mother-tongue." 

Wyclif  and  his  coadjutors  addressed  themselves,  therefore,  to 
the  great  task  of  turning  the  Vulgate  into  the  speech  of  the 
English  Midland.  He  toiled  especially  at  the  New  Testament, 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  95 

beginning  with  the  Gospels,  proceeding  to  the  Epistles  ;  a  faith- 
ful friend  of  his  named  Nicholas  Hereford,  chief  pillar  of  his 
party  at  Oxford,  devoted  his  attention  to  the  books  of  the  Old 
Testament.  Hereford's  translation  was  painfully  literal,  and 
had  to  be  revised  ;  so  John  Purvey,  one  of  Wyclif's  wandering 
preachers,  and  later  his  curate  at  Lutterworth,  went  over  the 
whole  work,  clearing  up  obscurities  and  polishing  the  style  ;  by 
the  year  1388  his  labor  was  done,  and  the  English  Bible  stood 
forth,  a  splendid  monument  of  energy  and  zeal. 

Next  in  importance  to  the  translation  of  the  Word  of  God  was 
its  exposition ;  Wyclif  imputed  to  preaching  an  extraordinary 
efficacy :  it  is  better,  he  said,  and  more  esteemed  by  Christ 
than  the  consecration  of  the  elements.  Hence  his  institution 
of  itinerant  preachers,  his  "poor  priests,"  who  in  their  evan- 
gelical poverty  resembled  the  primitive  Franciscans.  It  is 
interesting  to  know  that  he  bade  them  everywhere  do  all  they 
could  to  strengthen  those  ties  of  social  and  domestic  life  that 
were  being  so  rudely  strained  in  his  day.  One  of  his  later 
English  treatises,  "  Of  Servants  and  Lords,"  was  occasioned  by 
the  insurrection  of  the  year  1381.  It  discusses  the  relations  of 
classes  to  each  other,  and  dwells  upon  the  important  fact  (gen- 
erally ignored  then  and  for  ages  after)  that  masters  have  some 
duties  toward  those  whom  they  employ :  that  all  the  rights  are 
not  on  their  side,  and  all  the  duties  on  the  other.  At  the  same 
time,  the  author  is  careful  to  disavow,  on  the  part  of  the  "  poor 
priests,"  the  doctrine  attributed  to  them  that  tenants  may 
refuse  to  pay  rent  to  wicked  landlords.  The  impression  was 
general  that  the  new  religious  teaching  was  at  the  bottom  of  the 
social  disturbances  of  the  time  ;  and  some  incautious  followers 
of  Wyclif's  may  very  likely  have  drawn  extreme  but  not  illogi- 
cal conclusions  from  his  doctrine  of  dominion.  The  insurrec- 
tion was  certainly  an  embarrassing  circumstance ;  it  forced 
Wyclif  to  define  his  doctrine  anew,  and  expressly  to  restrict  its 
applicability :  tenants  may  not  keep  back  rent  due  to  wicked 


96  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

lords,  he  said,  though  they  may  withhold  tithes  from  sin- 
ful priests.  This  limitation  to  the  ecclesiastical  sphere  of 
the  great  principle  that  dominion  is  lost  by  sin,  though  incon- 
sistent, was  natural ;  Wyclif  shrank  with  horror  from  revolu- 
tionary inferences  from  it  which  he  had  not  foreseen  when  he 
first  enunciated  it,  during  the  contest  with  Urban  V,  years 
before.  Finally,  he  guarded  himself  and  his  doctrine  in  a  way 
that  emptied  it  of  all  practical  significance :  in  this  world,  he 
concluded,  one  can  never  know  that  a  man  is  void  of  God's 
grace  and  may  justly  be  deprived  of  the  power  conferred  by  it. 
As  regards  his  attitude  toward  the  fine  arts,  Wyclif  was  no 
iconoclast :  in  his  "  Trialogus  "  an  approved  speaker  points  out 
that  Christ  did  not  condemn  signs  in  themselves,  but  only 
abuse  of  them ;  the  brazen  serpent,  the  crucified  Lord  himself, 
were  both  signs.  Nevertheless,  in  Wyclif  s  nature  the  moral 
element  was  developed  to  the  sacrifice  of  the  ideal :  his  intense 
seriousness,  his  fear  lest  symbols  should  become  to  the  simple 
occasions  of  idolatry,  made  him  suspicious  of  the  use  of  the 
arts  in  the  service  of  the  sanctuary,  while  his  deep  sympathy 
with  the  poor  made  him  intolerant  of  the  diversion  of  wealth 
that  would  relieve  their  necessities  to  the  production  of  works 
of  art.  He  seems  to  have  felt  that  though  statues,  "gay 
windows,  and  paintings  "  were  not  wrong,  they  were  at  least 
inexpedient,  and  might  have  evil  effects.  "  They  worship  false 
gods  who  seek  blind  stocks  or  images  and  offer  to  them  more 
than  to  poor,  bedrid  men.  Rich  men  clothe  dead  stocks  and 
stones  with  precious  clothes,  with  gold  and  silver  and  pearls 
and  gayness  to  the  world,  and  suffer  poor  men  go  sore  a-cold 
and  at  much  mischief."  His  dislike  of  the  elaborate  ritual  of 
the  Middle  Ages  —  a  gorgeous  form  closely  allied  in  its  nature 
to  the  fine  arts  —  was  determined  by  his  belief  in  the  potency 
of  preaching,  which  seemed  to  him  to  be  interfered  with  by  the 
time  spent  in  ceremonies  ;  while  the  pains  that  had  to  be  taken 
to  avoid  mistakes  in  these  intricate  "  rites  and  rules  of  sinful 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  97 

men"  made  them  as  intolerable  as  the  requirements  of  the 
Jewish  law,  —  the  freedom  of  the  gospel  was  quite  done  away 
by  such  "novelry."  As  for  church  music,  "descant  and 
counter  note,  organ  and  small  breaking  —  vain  japes  —  stir 
vain  men  to  dancing  more  than  to  mourning.  Where  there  are 
forty  or  fifty  in  a  choir,  three  or  four  proud  lorels  sing  so  that 
none  can  hear  the  sentence,  and  all  others  shall  be  dumb  and 
look  on  them  like  fools." 

It  is  well  known  that  up  to  the  time  of  the  papal  schism,  in 
1378,  Wyclif's  heresies  concerned  no  doctrinal  point,  but  only 
such  questions  as  the  relation  of  church  and  state,  the  govern- 
ment and  worship  of  the  church,  and  the  morals  and  manners 
of  the  clergy.  He  had  become  so  formidable,  however,  by  his 
earnestness  and  ability,  the  indisputable  strength  of  his  moral 
position,  and  the  ever  increasing  number  of  his  followers,  that 
the  great  prelates,  monks,  and  friars  whose  worldliness  he 
assailed  began  to  feel  that  something  must  be  done  to  suppress 
him,  and  he  was  summoned  by  the  bishop  of  London  to  answer 
for  his  errors  before  a  synod  at  St.  Paul's  in  the  winter  of  1377. 
But  the  influence  of  the  University  of  Oxford,  where  he  had 
troops  of  friends ;  the  favor  of  the  government,  which  he  served 
so  well  during  the  controversy  with  the  papacy ;  the  enthusiasm 
of  the  people,  who  regarded  him  as  their  champion ;  and  the 
powerful  protection  of  John,  duke  of  Lancaster,  eldest  surviv- 
ing son  of  Edward  III,  neutralized  the  utmost  efforts  of  his 
enemies  ;  it  was  impossible  to  secure  his  conviction,  and  the 
synod  broke  up  in  confusion.  Foiled  at  home,  his  embittered 
foes  appealed  to  Pope  Gregory  XI,  who,  in  May  of  the  same 
year,  fulminated  five  bulls  against  the  reformer.  It  is  to  be 
noted  that  the  propositions  condemned  in  these  were  practical 
consequences  of  the  doctrine  of  dominion  :  they  concerned  the 
power  of  prelates,  and  points  of  government  and  discipline,  — 
the  constitution  of  the  church,  and  not  her  doctrinal  decisions. 
Thus  fortified,  Wyclif's  opponents  attempted  again  to  bring 


98  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

him  to  judgment :  he  was  cited  to  appear  before  the  bishop  of 
London  and  the  archbishop  of  Canterbury  at  Lambeth,  in  1378, 
—  but  nothing  of  significance  was  done  by  them.  In  the  summer 
of  that  year  occurred  an  event  of  rare  magnitude  in  European 
history,  an  immediate  effect  of  which  was  Wyclif's  complete 
spiritual  enfranchisement.  Upon  the  death  of  Gregory  XI 
the  cardinals  elected  as  his  successor  Prignano,  a  Neapolitan, 
who  assumed  the  title  of  Urban  VI.  More  than  seventy  years 
had  elapsed  since  an  Italian  had  worn  the  tiara.  Urban  fixed 
his  residence  at  Rome,  and  began  at  once,  and  with  some 
acerbity  of  temper,  considerable  disciplinary  reforms.  Dissat- 
isfied with  his  proceedings,  the  proud  and  luxurious  French 
cardinals,  who  were  in  a  large  majority  in  the  conclave,  pre- 
tending that  their  choice  had  been  made  under  compulsion, 
and  was  therefore  invalid,  proceeded  to  elect  one  of  their  own 
number  in  Urban's  stead.  He  took  the  title  of  Clement  VII, 
and  established  his  court  at  Avignon.  Thus  originated  the 
memorable  Schism  of  the  West,  which  shook  the  very  founda- 
tions of  papal  power.  Rival  lines  of  pontiffs  divided  the 
suffrages  of  Europe  ;  they  made  desperate  efforts  to  crush 
each  other,  —  it  was  a  shameful  but  instructive  spectacle. 
"  God  hath  cloven  the  head  of  Antichrist,"  exclaimed  Wyclif, 
exultantly  ;  it  seemed  to  him  a  God-given  opportunity  for  the 
English  to  throw  off  the  papal  dominion  altogether.  Now 
began  the  last  and  busiest  period  of  his  life,  in  which  he  trans- 
lated the  New  Testament,  questioned  and  ere  long  boldly 
controverted  the  received  opinion  concerning  the  eucharist, 
and  appealed  to  the  intelligence  of  the  people  in  tract  after 
tract,  couched  in  vigorous  English.  It  was  inevitable  that  a 
strenuous  thinker  who,  as  we  have  seen,  regarded  with  cold 
dislike  the  details  of  the  worship  of  his  day,  should  sooner  or 
later  penetrate  to  the  central  point  of  that  worship  —  the  doc- 
trine of  the  eucharist —  and  bring  it  into  question  ;  that  a  clear 
thinker  should  revolt  from  that  confusion  of  thought  which 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  99 

supposed  a  conversion  of  one  substance  into  another,  the 
phenomena  meanwhile  remaining  unchanged ;  that  a  zealous 
reformer  should  at  last  fall  foul  of  a  doctrine  that  seemed  to  be 
the  innermost  intrenchment  of  the  worst  evils  that  afflicted  the 
church.  Wyclif  utterly  rejected  the  dogma  of  transubstantia- 
tion  as  unscriptural  and  idolatrous :  Christ,  the  apostles,  and 
the  saints  of  the  primitive  church  all  taught,  he  maintained, 
that  "the  sacred  host,  white  and  round,"  is  at  the  same  time 
true  bread  and  the  Lord's  body. 

This  daring  definition  brought  on  another  crisis ;  many  of 
his  followers,  fearful  of  the  innovation  and  its  possible  conse- 
quences, fell  away  from  him  ;  and  a  council  was  held  in  the 
spring  of  the  year  1382  at  which  this  and  other  statements  in 
his  works  were  condemned.  Personally,  however,  Wyclif  suf- 
fered no  harm  ;  he  withdrew  to  his  quiet  rectory  in  the  pleasant 
village  of  Lutterworth,  and  after  two  years  of  faithful  work 
there,  died  in  peace  at  the  close  of  the  year  1384.  And  now, 
as  his  grand  figure  fades  into  that  distant  past  from  which  we 
have  summoned  it,  it  were  best,  perhaps,  that  some  recollection 
of  his  firm  hold  upon  spiritual  realities  should  henceforth  be 
associated  with  his  name ;  that  we  should  pay  his  memory  the 
honor  due  to  it  for  his  undaunted  claim  for  man  to  an  immedi- 
ate, personal  relation  with  the  eternal  Origin  of  things.  Few 
have  pierced  with  as  keen  a  vision  through  the  outward  shows 
of  things  to  the  realities  that  underlie  them,  —  few  have  been 
as  thoroughly  convinced  of  the  vanity  of  all  forms  that  are  not 
vitalized  by  spirit.  "  Baptism  by  water  is  nothing  without 
baptism  by  fire  —  that  is,  the  Holy  Ghost,"  —  he  said.  "  Crown 
[tonsure]  and  cloth  make  no  priest,  nor  the  emperor's  bishop 
with  his  words,  but  power  that  Christ  giveth."  "  Not  babbling 
of  the  lips  but  a  holy  life  is  prayer."  And  this  noble  sentence 
lingers  like  music  in  the  memory :  "  God  the  Trinity  is  with 
each  creature  by  might,  wisdom,  and  goodness  to  keep  it,  for 
else  it  should  turn  to  nought;  but  God  is  with  good  men  of 


100  OUTLINE   OF  THE  PHILOSOPHY 

virtuous  life  by  grace,  and  dwelleth  in  their  souls  as  his  own 
temple." 

To  the  series  of  moralists  and  reformers  belongs  the  poet 
John  Gower;  he  is  to  be  classed  with  Langland  and  Wyclif 
rather  than,  as  he  customarily  is,  with  Chaucer.  It  must  not, 
however,  be  inferred  that  he  was  affiliated  to  the  "  new  sect  of 
lollardy  ":  he  is  emphatic  in  his  denunciations  of  it ;  he  adjures 
his  reader : 

"  Beware  that  thou  be  not  oppressed 
With  Antichristes  lollardie :  .  .  . 
—  this  newe  tapinage 
Of  lollardie  goeth  about 
To  sette  Christes  faith  in  doubt  — 
Such  newe  lore  I  rede  eschewe." 

He  thus  affords  interesting  and  valuable  evidence  that  the 
reformatory  impulse  of  the  hour  was  deep  and  general,  —  too 
wide  to  be  confined  within  sectarian  lines. 

Gower  was  several  years  older  than  Chaucer,  and  he  outlived 
him  by  some  years.  His  uVox  Clamantis,"  in  Latin  verse, 
was  occasioned  by  the  insurrection  of  1381  :  it  is  a  searching 
analysis  of  the  social  and  moral  evils  to  which  he  referred  the 
discontent  of  the  peasantry,  and  the  outbreak  of  revolution. 
The  condition  of  England  seemed  to  him  deplorable,  —  "  the 
end  of  the  world  is  fallen  upon  us."  At  the  head  of  the  gov- 
ernment was  an  ignorant  and  careless  boy.  A  shocking  schism 
in  the  papacy  was  bringi*§.  manifold  woe  upon  the  church: 
"  we  fall  between  two  stools."  The  governors  of  the  church 
were  corrupt ;  they  committed  every  deadly  sin ;  the  parish 
priests  and  roving  friars  followed  their  example, — they  were 
greedy  and  drunken,  lustful,  hypocritical.  Soldiers  were 
extortionate  and  licentious,  merchants  dishonest,  lawyers 
crafty  and  unjust,  laborers  discontented,  and  voracious  as 
a  pack  of  wild  beasts.  In  the  midst  of  such  corruption 
what  was  to  be  done?  Gower's  reply  is  like  Langland's,— 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  101 

let  every  man  take  care  of  himself,  have  faith  in  God,  who  is 
over  all,  do  his  duty  to  his  fellows,  and  use  the  world  well, 
remembering  that  its  pleasures  and  possessions  pass  away. 

This  anxious  interest  in  the  social  problem  contrasts  strik- 
ingly with  the  unconcern  of  Chaucer,  who  ignores  it  so  airily 
that  from  his  works  one  would  never  guess  that  one  of  the 
most  serious  convulsions  in  English  history  had  happened  in 
his  time. 

Gower  wrote,  in  French,  another  moral  essay  in  verse,  the 
"  Speculum  Meditantis."  This  does  not  appear  to  have  been 
a  successful  effort ;  no  copy  of  it  is  known  to  exist ;  but  his 
last  and  greatest  work,  the  "  Confessio  Amantis,"  was  ex- 
tremely popular  in  his  own  day  and  for  ages  after.  It  is  writ- 
ten in  English,  in  smooth,  octosyllabic  couplets.  It  consists 
of  a  really  interesting  prologue,  and  eight  books,  one  for  each 
of  the  deadly  sins,  and  one  a  summary  of  the  philosophic  and 
moral,  scientific  and  liberal  learning  of  the  poet's  own  age. 
The  different  books  consist  of  groups  of  tales  that  illustrate 
the  deadly  sins;  they  are  borrowed  from  the  Bible,  from  Ovid, 
Cassiodorus,  and  Isidore,  from  the  "  Tale  of  Troy,"  of  Alex- 
ander the  Great,  and  of  Lancelot  du  Lac,  and  from ;  the 
popular  collection  known  as  the  "Gesta  Romanorum,"  and 
the  "  Speculum  Regum  "  of  Godfrey  of  Viterbo.  Gower  was  a 
learned,  not  to  say  a  bookish  man,  according  to  the  fashion  of 
his  time.  "  I  read  as  the  cronique  saith,"  —  "In  a  cronique 
this  I  read"  —"This  find  I  —  rt^p  ;~  poesy"  —are  formulas 
of  frequent  occurrence  in  his  work.  He  strings  his  stories 
together  upon  the  tenuous  thread  of  a  supposed  confession 
made  by  a  young  lover,  whose  father  confessor  examines 
him  in  the  seven  sins,  and  points  his  precepts  with  appropriate 
tales.  Some  of  these  ate  tedious  enough,  and  one  cannot  but 
echo  the  unhappy  young  penitent's  unguarded  admission  : 

"  The  tales  sounen  in  min  ere, 
But  yet  min  herte  is  elleswhere." 


102  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

But  what  makes  Gower  truly  great,  and  worthy  of  lasting 
remembrance,  is  his  moral  view  of  the  universe.  To  him  in 
truth  preeminently  belongs  the  title  "moral  "  —  bestowed  upon 
him,  half  mischievously  perhaps,  by  Chaucer.  Two  great  ideas 
were  the  fountains  of  his  inspiration  :  the  thought  of  a  myste- 
rious correspondence  between  the  physical  and  moral  spheres, 
between  nature  and  spirit,  and  that  of  human  freedom,  of  a 
power  in  man  to  rise  above  the  force  of  circumstance,  and  to 
put  the  stars  under  his  feet.  Gower  believed  that  the  Black 
Death  was  incurred  by  man  as  a  punishment  for  his  sin. 

"  The  sun  and  moon  eclipsen  both 
And  ben  with  mannes  sinne  wroth  ; 
The  purest  air  for  sin  aloft 
Hath  ben  and  is  corrupt  full  oft." 

The  ground  of  this  belief  lay  in  a  supposed  interdependence 
between  the  world  and  man  the  microcosm.  The  four  elements 
of  the  external  world  had  their  counterparts  in  the  four  humors 
of  man's  body,  and  between  his  soul  and  these  there  was 
mysterious  union.  But  between  soul  and  body  strife  has 
arisen,  — and  the  result  is  sin: 

"  For  sin  of  his  condition 
Is  mother  of  division." 

Disturbances  in  the  realm  of  nature  are  the  portentous  signs 
and  punishment  of  this  moral  discord. 

"  The  man,  as  telleth  the  clergie, 
Is  as  a  world  in  his  partie, 
And  when  this  little  world  misturneth 
The  grete  world  all  overturneth  ; 
The  land,  the  sea,  the  firmament, 
They  axen  alle  jugement 
Against  the  man." 

The  other  thought,  which  he  wearies  not  in  reiterating,  is 
that  man,  if  he  is  true  to  himself,  is  not  the  sport  of  chance. 
Duty,  not  Fortune,  determines  his  success  and  happiness.  The 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  103 

world  is  out  of  joint,  and  why?  Some  say,  Because  of  For- 
tune, or,  Because  of  the  aspect  of  the  stars.  Then  the  poet 
delivers  his  message  : 

—  "  The  man  is  overall 
His  owne  cause  of  weal  and  woe  : 
That  we  fortune  clepe  so 
Out  of  the  man  himself  it  groweth." 

An  invigorating  truth,  banishing  a  host  of  grisly  superstitions 
whose  presence  benumbs  the  soul  !  "  All  earthly  things  which 
God  began,"  he  says,  in  reassuring  tones,  "were  only  made  to 
serve  man."  The  planets  do  indeed  control  mundane  affairs, 
diseases,  tempests,  wars, — but  good  and  wise  men  need  not 
fear  the  stars —  (and  then  come  the  immortal  lines)  : 

"  For  one  man,  if  him  well  befalle, 
Is  more  worth  than  ben  they  alle 
Towardes  Him  that  weldeth  all." 

A  flash  of  insight  like  that  penetrates  the  profoundest 
depths  of  the  mysteries  of  creation  and  redemption  and  makes 
them  luminous ;  a  cheery  call  like  that  out  of  the  ages  gives 
fresh  meaning  to  life,  inspires  with  new  courage,  and  lightens 
the  oppressive  weight  that  natural  science  with  its  mechanical 
processes  would  lay  upon  the  soul.  With  one  sweep  of  her 
pinion  the  heavenly  muse  of  poetry  exalts  little  man  to  the 
sublime  station  that  is  rightfully  his  ;  from  that  altitude  the 
world,  weary,  heavy,  and  unintelligible  before,  becomes  trans- 
parent and  intelligible.  Thus,  in  the  evening  of  the  fourteenth 
century,  did  John  Gower  transcend  the  superstitions  of  his 
time  ;  and  thus  may  we  in  this  latter  day  shake  off  with  him 
the  nightmare  of  fatalism,  and  transcend  the  no  less  enfeebling 
superstitions  of  a  school  of  scientific  thought  that  would  arro- 
gate to  sensuous  experience  all  reality,  and  that  despises  and 
denies  the  ideal.  As  long  as  science  lasts,  as  long  as  the  world 
endures,  poetry  will  endure  to  give  the  spirit  its  due,  to  correct 


104  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

the  one-sided  and  therefore  faulty  and  dangerous  estimates  of 
a  science  blind  to  the  moral  and  ideal,  and  to  resist  the  mate- 
rializing tendency  of  our  every-day  life. 

It  is  worth  noting  upon  how  much  higher  a  moral  level  than 
Chaucer's  Gower  stood.  Chaucer  never  worked  free  of  the 
eery  influence  of  the  constellations ;  how  numerous  his  refer- 
ences to  judicial  astrology  are  every  one  familiar  with  his  works 
knows  well.  "In  the  stars,"  he  says,  "clearer  than  is  glass, 
is  written  the  death  of  every  man,  without  a  doubt.  Certainly 
our  appetites  here,  be  it  of  war  or  peace  or  hate  or  love,  are 
all  ruled  by  Destiny.  Fortune  can  turn  her  wheel  and  out  of 
joy  bring  men  to  sorrow."  With  him  a  favorite  maxim  is, 
"  Make  virtue  of  necessity." 

A  memorable  characteristic  of  Gower's  (reminding  us  how 
far  we  have  travelled  from  the  era  of  the  Crusades)  is  his 
recognition  of  the  rights  even  of  infidels.  He  believes  that 
Christian  men  run  counter  to  their  Lord's  commands  when 
they  shed  the  blood  of  heathen  folk,  for  these  too  have  souls 
to  save.  His  missionary  zeal  recalls  the  evangelical  labors  of 
his  Spanish  contemporary,  Vincent  Ferrer,  among  the  Moham- 
medans of  Granada. 

"  And  for  to  sleen  the  hethen  alle, 
I  not  what  good  there  mighte  falle 
So  mochel  blood  though  there  be  shad. 
This  finde  I  writen,  how  Crist  bad 
That  no  man  other  shoulde  slee  .  .  . 
To  sleen  and  fighten  they  us  bidde 
Hem  whom  they  shuld,  as  the  boke  saith, 
Converten  unto  Cristes  feith  .  .  . 
A  Sarazin  if  I  slee  shall 
I  slee  the  soule  forth  with  all,  — 
And  that  was  never  Cristes  lore." 

Passages  of  natural  description,  sometimes  quite  pleasing, 
generally  conventional,  are  scattered  through  the  "  Confessio 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  105 

Amantis."  The  woful  lover  seeks  the  solitude  of  the  woods 
and  there  gives  way  to  his  feelings  : 

"  —  In  the  moneth  of  May, 
Whan  every  brid  hath  chose  his  make 
And  thenketh  his  merthes  for  to  make 
Of  love  that  he  hath  acheved,  .  . 
Unto  the  wood  I  gan  to  fare, 
Nought  for  to  singe  with  the  briddes, 
For  whan  I  was  the  wood  amiddes 
I  fonde  a  swete  grene  pleine, 
And  there  I  gan  my  wo  compleigne." 

In  another  place  there  are  a  few  pretty  lines  about  the  sun 

—  "  which  is  the  worldes  eye, 
Through  whom  the  lusty  compaignie 
Of  foules  by  the  morwe  singe,  — 
The  freshe  floures  sprede  and  springe,  — 
The  highe  tre  the  ground  beshadeth, 
And  every  mannes  herte  gladdeth." 

Hopelessly  conventional,  pedantic,  and  arid  are  Gower's  ref- 
erences to  the  arts.  Amid  the  glories  of  mediaeval  architec- 
ture and  sculpture,  for  which  he  seems  to  have  had  no  eye,  he 
nods  over  names  gathered  from  his  books  : 

"  Zeuzis  found  first  the  portreture, 
And  Prometheus  the  sculpture  ; 
After  what  forme  that  hem  thought 
The  resemblaunce  anon  they  wrought." 

and  then  (O  discriminative  Gower  !),— 
"  Berconius  of  cokerie 
First  made  the  delicacie." 

And  yet  to  this  poor,  prosy  old  poet  was  granted  the  supreme 
vision  of  that  age  :  "One  man,  if  he  behave  well,  is  worth 
more  than  planets  and  stars  to  Him  who  wields  them  all." 

When  Gower  wrote  the  "  Confessio  Amantis,"  sometime 
about  the  year  1386,  he  was  living  as  a  "clerk"  and  lay 
brother  with  the  monks  of  St.  Mary  Overies,  Southwark.  In 


106  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

1397,  when  he  was  seventy  years  of  age,  he  married.  He  had 
need  of  a  nurse,  for  in  1400  (the  year  of  Chaucer's  death,  and 
probably  of  Langland's  also)  he  became  blind.  He  died  in 
1408,  leaving  his  widow  well  provided  for,  and  dividing  the 
residue  of  his  property  among  the  churches  of  Southwark,  the 
leper-houses,  and  a  hospital  for  the  blind  and  infirm. 

It  is  instructive  to  observe  how,  simultaneously  with  this  re- 
forming movement  that  we  have  been  studying,  English  Gothic 
architecture  underwent  a  change.  The  straight  lines  and  right 
angles  of  the  Rectilinear  or  Perpendicular  style  began  to  replace 
and  repress  the  graceful  and  luxuriant  but  often  weak  and  even 
wanton  curves  of  the  Decorated  style,  - —  a  change  that  symbolizes 
delicately  and  beautifully  the  passage  of  the  sentimental  into 
the  moral  epoch.  The  mullions  of  cathedral  windows  began 
to  strike  right  through  the  tangle  of  flowing  tracery  to  the 
mouldings  of  the  window-heads  ;  transoms  intersected  mul- 
lions ;  the  flat  surfaces  of  walls,  buttresses,  and  towers  were 
ribbed  with  vertical  and  horizontal  mouldings,  and  thus  marked 
off  into  panels  ;  within,  the  heads  of  pier-arches  were  de- 
pressed, the  triforium  disappeared  and  a  plane  surface  closely 
ruled  up  and  down  with  parallel  lines  took  its  place.  It  was 
like  an  invasion  of  architecture  by  carpentry  ;  fancy  was  con- 
fined by  measurement ;  the  style  was  mechanical,  inorganic,  — 
yet  something  in  its  regularity,  its  plain,  practical  nature,  sttited 
the  English  genius ;  it  was  found  to  be  peculiarly  fitted  for 
collegiate  structures  and  manorial  halls  as  well  as  for  church- 
building  ;  and  it  became  the  favorite  and  characteristic  variety 
of  English  Gothic.  It  first  appeared  in  Abbot  Litlington's 
work  at  Westminster,  in  the  decades  1366-86,  —  but  it  was 
left  to  William  of  Wykeham,  bishop  of  Winchester,  to  develop 
it  with  such  strength  and  consistency  that  it  has  become  in- 
dissolubly  associated  with  his  name.  In  1386,  Wykeham 
founded  New  College,  Oxford ;  the  year  following,  Winchester 
College  ;  meanwhile  he  was  remodelling  his  cathedral,  the  nave 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  107 

of  which  is  the  crowning  example  of  Perpendicular  style.  The 
nave  of  Canterbury  cathedral  was  also  rebuilt  in  the  new 
fashion  at  this  time.  The  utmost  elaboration  of  Perpendicular 
tracery  is  displayed  in  the  great  east  window  of  York  Minster, 
constructed  in  the  years  1403-1408  ;  the  amazing  intricacy  of 
the  work  fatigues  the  sense.  (A  continental  example  of  the 
triumph  of  parallelism  over  flamboyancy  is  afforded  by  the 
marvellous  cathedral  of  Milan,  which  was  being  constructed  at 
this  very  epoch.)  During  the  Lancastrian  Period — from  1399 
to  1461  — the  fa9ades  and  profiles  of  several  important  cathe- 
drals —  York,  Lincoln,  Wells  —  were  rendered  more  imposing 
by  the  completion  of  their  triple  towers.  That  was  the  palmy 
period,  moreover,  of  parish-church  building  :  then  uprose,  all 
over  England,  many  of  those  picturesque  churches  with  their 
square  gray  towers,  that,  often  embowered  in  foliage,  are  such 
salient  and  attractive  features  in  the  landscape. 

The  adaptability  of  the  Rectilinear  style  to  scholastic  pur- 
poses was  exemplified  at  All  Souls  College,  Oxford,  —  founded 
by  Archbishop  Chichely  in  1437;  at  the  royal  foundation  of 
Eton,  in  1446;  and  (consummately)  at  Magdalen  College, 
Oxford,  founded  by  Bishop  Waynflete  in  1459. 

Among  the  minor  arts  may  be  mentioned  the  sepulchral 
brasses  that  were  multiplied  in  this  period  :  large  plates  of 
burnished  metal  let  into  slabs  in  the  floors  of  churches  and 
mortuary  chapels,  and  engraved  with  figures  to  represent  those 
who  rested  below.  The  designs  are  highly  characteristic  of 
the  time ;  they  are  quite  conventional  in  feature  and  figure,  and 
are  almost  Byzantine  in  their  stiff  symmetry,  their  straight  and 
clear-cut  outlines,  and  tendency  to  attenuated  forms.  The 
head-dresses  are  set,  the  faces  flat  and  staring,  and  the  lines 
that  represent  the  folds  of  drapery  are  sharp  and  angular, 
sometimes  almost  parallel  as  they  fall  from  the  waist  down- 
ward, to  break  in  stiff  folds  about  the  feet  with  their  pointed 
shoes. 


108  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

Before  we  pass  to  the  history  and  literature  of  the  Lancas*- 
trian  era,  it  will  be  well  to  review,  briefly,  the  general  condition 
of  Europe  at  the  close  of  the  fourteenth  and  beginning  of  the 
fifteenth  century:  At  no  other  period  does  the  intimate  con- 
nection that  subsisted  between  the  states  of  Catholic  Christen- 
dom become  more  apparent,  —  the  subtle  sympathy  that  bound 
them  together  in  such  a  manner  that  movements  originating  in 
any  one  were  soon  propagated  among  the  others,  so  that  they 
all  underwent  similar  changes  at  about  the  same  time;  the 
working  of  a  like  spirit  can  be  perceived  at  once  in  all. 

In  Spain,  the  ferocious  dynastic  struggle  already  alluded  to 
reached  its^crisis  in  the  year  1369,  when  Pedro  the  Cruel  was 
slain  by  the  hand  of  his  half-brother,  Henry  of  Trastamar,  — 
a  son  of  Leonora  de  Guzman.  The  new  monarch  mounted  an 
uneasy  throne  ;  he  and  his  descendants  were  involved  in  inter- 
mittent wars  with  England  and  Portugal,  —  which  latter  power 
meanwhile  underwent  a  similar  dynastic  change.  The  Duke  of 
Lancaster  married  Pedro's  daughter,  and  advanced  her  claim 
to  the  crown  of  Castile.  When  the  papal  schism  broke  out,  the 
Spanish  states  for  a  while  stood  neutral ;  but  French  interest 
brought  them  at  last  to  recognize  the  Avignonese  pope.  Eng- 
land and  Portugal,  on  the  contrary,  professed  obedience  to  the 
Roman  pontiff,  Urban  VI  ;  and  he  granted  an  indulgence  to 
any  who  should  aid  the  Duke  of  Lancaster  in  his  contest  with 
the  usurping  king  of  Castile.  Henry's  son,  John  I,  suffered  a 
severe  defeat  at  the  hands  of  the  Portuguese  in  1385,  which 
rendered  his  position  so  difficult  that  he  had  to  propose  a  com- 
promise by  which  the  rival  claims  to  the  crown  were  reconciled  ; 
he  married  his  young  son,  Henry,  to  the  Duke's  daughter.  His 
death  soon  after  plunged  Spain  into  years  of  civil  strife  ;  during 
the  minority  of  the  boy-king  the  great  nobles  and  prelates  con- 
tended for  the  regency  :  among  the  latter  one  at  least,  the 
archbishop  of  Santiago,  held  to  the  Roman  pope.  It  may  be 
that  this  fact  contains  the  secret  of  the  political  confusion  of 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  109 

those  years.  Peace  was  attained  only  when  the  young  king 
assumed  full  power,  which  he  enhanced  by  a  bold  stroke  of 
statecraft.  During  those  tumultuous  times  flourished  one  who 
was  to  be  their  chronicler  —  Pedro  Lopez  de  Ayala,  courtier, 
chancellor,  soldier,  and  chief,  if  not  the  only  distinguished  man 
of  letters  of  his  nation  in  that  age.  He  translated  into  Spanish 
the  works  of  Livy  and  Boethius,  the  "  Morals "  of  Pope 
Gregory  I,  and  Boccaccio's  "  Falls  of  Princes,"  and  wrote  a 
moralizing  poem,  "  El  Rimado  de  Palacio,"  in  which  he 
described,  quite  in  Gower's  vein,  but  with  occasional  touches 
of  the  humor  that  Gower  lacked,  the  duties  of  rulers,  the  cor- 
ruption of  the  age,  and  the  need  of  reform.  He  died  in  1407 
—  a  year  before  the  English  poet. 

The  schism  in  the  papacy  was  the  supreme  concern  of  the 
period,  and  it  is  highly  probable  that  it  may  serve,  to  a  degree 
not  generally  realized,  as  a  clue  to  the  labyrinth  of  contem- 
porary politics.  It  should  not  be  forgotten  that  Urban  VI 
came  to  the  chair  as  a  reforming  pope.  Catherine  of  Siena, 
the  spiritual  heroine,  the  most  noted  and  influential  woman  of 
her  day,  engaged  herself  heart  and  soul  in  his  cause.  But  he 
was  sadly  unequal  to  his  opportunity  ;  the  severity  with  which 
he  began  his  reforms  was  akin  to  mania  ;  false  to  his  trust,  he 
soon  abandoned  himself  to  shameful  nepotism ;  became  em- 
broiled with  the  queen  of  Naples,  and  made  the  conquest  of 
her  kingdom  the  end  and  aim  of  his  pontificate.  Foiled  in 
spite  of  desperate  efforts,  he  had  to  flee  to  Genoa ;  there  he 
caused  five  cardinals  whom  he  suspected  of  conspiracy  against 
him  to  be  strangled.  It  was  whispered  then,  and  has  since 
been  generally  believed  that  his  mind  was  unbalanced.  His 
successor,  Boniface  IX,  was  a  remarkably  able  man.  At  his 
accession,  anathemas  were  cordially  exchanged  with  his  rival 
of  Avignon,  from  whose  obedience  he  succeeded  erelong  in 
detaching  the  kingdom  of  Naples.  His  interference  precipi- 
tated a  revolution  in  German  politics,  and  indications  are  not 


110  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

wanting  that  he  was  an  agent  in  the  dynastic  change  in  England. 
The  peace  that  Richard  II  made  with  France  in  1396  drew  him 
into  relations,  at  least  of  negotiation,  with  the  Avignonese  pope 
Benedict  XIII.  This  was  the  time  when  attempts  were  made 
by  several  governments,  greatly  to  the  annoyance  of  both 
popes,  to  induce  them  to  resign.  Boniface  had  already  had 
occasion  to  remonstrate  with  Richard  in  regard  to  his  ecclesi- 
astical policy.  After  the  conclusion  of  the  unpopular  peace 
above  mentioned,  it  will  be  remembered  that  Richard  appre- 
hended certain  of  his  opponents  and  banished  others.  Among 
the  latter  was  Thomas  Arundel,  archbishop  of  Canterbury, 
whose  powerful  influence  was  largely  instrumental  in  raising 
Henry  of  Lancaster  to  the  throne  of  England  in  Richard's 
stead.  Immediately  after  this  revolution  in  the  government 
Arundel  was  restored  to  his  see  by  Boniface  IX.  Hostilities 
were  renewed  between  England  and  France ;  Henry  relied 
upon  the  church  for  support ;  and  Boniface,  as  if  emboldened 
by  the  belief  that  he  had  a  firmer  hold  upon  the  nation  than 
before,  revoked  certain  concessions  that  he  had  formerly 
granted. 

The  troubled  reign  of  Wenzel,  king  of  Bohemia,  and  until 
his  deposition  in  1400,  king  of  the  Romans  and  emperor-elect, 
almost  exactly  coincided  in  duration  with  the  papal  schism. 
Wenzel  was  rude  even  to  brutality,  and  coarse  in  his  pleasures 
—  but  perhaps  his  character  was  not  as  black  as  it  has  been 
painted  by  clerical  odium.  He  was  unable  to  cope  with  the 
turbulence  of  the  great  nobles,  and  though  he  overawed  them 
once  by  a  stroke  of  policy  similar  to  that  practised  at  the  same 
period  in  England  and  Spain,  his  partial  and  temporary  success 
was  equivalent  to  failure,  and  left  him  hated  and  suspected,  and 
in  worse  condition  than  before.  But  when  he  joined  the  king 
of  France  in  urging  the  rival  popes  to  abdicate,  the  measure  of 
his  iniquity  was  full ;  Boniface  retorted  by  commanding  the 
electors  to  choose  another  emperor.  The  result  was  fresh 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  Ill 

confusion  in  that  age  of  countless  schisms  ;  there  was  a  division 
in  the  college  :  the  electors  of  the  Rhine  were  in  the  papal 
interest,  and  chose  Rupert  of  the  Palatinate  ;  those  of  the 
north  and  east  preferred  Frederick  of  Saxony  ;  so  for  a  moment 
there  were  three  shadowy  emperors  in  the  field,  —  but  the 
number  was  almost  instantly  reduced  by  the  assassination  of 
Frederick.  Wenzel  died  in  1419 — not  without  suspicion  of 
foul  play. 

In  the  far  north-east  of  Europe  profound  political  changes 
took  place.  After  the  extinction  of  the  Piast  dynasty,  Jagello, 
duke  of  Lithuania,  was  called  to  the  throne  of  Poland,  and 
devoted  his  energies  through  a  long  reign  to  the  depression  of 
the  power  of  the  Teutonic  knights.  At  Tannenberg,  in  the 
year  1410,  the  order  suffered  a  defeat  from  which  it  never 
recovered ;  and  thus  the  glory  of  another  great  institution  of 
the  Middle  Ages  passed  away. 

Meantime,  confusion  verging  upon  anarchy  reigned  in  the 
dominions  of  the  House  of  Austria.  The  young  duke,  Albert 
IV,  died  in  1404,  entrusting  to  his  cousins,  William  and  Leo- 
pold, the  guardianship  of  his  son,  Albert  V,  then  a  mere  infant. 
William's  death,  in  1406,  was  the  signal  for  civil  strife  ;  Leopold 
was  involved  in  disputes  with  his  younger  brother,  the  intract- 
able Ernest,  at  the  head  of  a  powerful  faction.  The  spirit  of 
feudalism  broke  out  once  more  ;  the  nobles  were  all  in  arms ; 
for  five  years  the  land  was  desolated  with  civil  war  ;  commerce 
and  agriculture  declined  ;  robbers  infested  the  highways,  —  it 
was  the  darkest  hour  in  the  history  of  the  duchy.  It  was  also 
a  school  of  hard  political  experience  for  the  young  Albert,  who 
assumed  control  of  the  government  upon  Leopold's  death,  in 
1411.  He  proved  to  be  a  sagacious  ruler,  restored  peace  and 
prosperity  to  his  country,  and  laid  the  foundations  of  the  future 
grandeur  of  his  house. 

While  the  condition  of  Austria  was  beginning  to  improve, 
that  of  France  was  rapidly  approaching  the  lowest  degree  of 


112  OUTLINE   OF  THE   PHILOSOPHY 

humiliation  that  her  annals  record.  Her  king,  Charles  VI, 
was  demented  ;  his  queen  was  an  evil  woman,  and  exerted  a 
pernicious  influence  upon  state  affairs  ;  the  conduct  of  govern- 
ment was  a  prize  that  was  contended  for  by  raging  factions 
under  the  lead  of  the  rival  dukes  of  Burgundy  and  Orleans  ; 
and  the  people  were  wretched.  If  anything  beside  self-interest 
guided  the  policy  of  Louis  of  Orleans  it  was  his  devotion  to  the 
cause  of  Pope  Benedict  XIII  :  with  his  help  Benedict  escaped 
from  his  palace  at  Avignon,  where  he  had  been  imprisoned  for 
years  by  the  royal  troops,  in  the  spring  of  1403,  and  shortly 
after  the  kingdom  returned  to  his  obedience.  The  fortunes 
of  both  pope  and  duke  rose  and  fell  together ;  in  the  fall  of 
1407  Louis  was  foully  murdered,  and  Benedict  erelong  had  to 
flee  into  Spain.  For  the  next  seven  years  the  power  of  the 
duke  of  Burgundy  was,  upon  the  whole,  in  the  ascendant. 
He  favored  a  conciliar  settlement  of  the  papal  controversy  ; 
the  city  of  Pisa,  lately  conquered  by  Florence,  was  offered  by 
that  republic  as  an  eligible  site  for  the  proposed  synod  ;  there, 
in  the  year  1409,  the  fathers  met,  and,  dominated  by  the 
genius  of  Jean  Gerson,  declared  the  rival  pontiffs  heretics, 
schismatics,  and  perjurers,  deposed  them  both,  and  elected  in 
their  stead  an  aged  Greek  cardinal,  who  took  the  title  of 
Alexander  V.  The  Roman  and  Spanish  popes,  however, 
refused  to  accept  the  character  given  them  by  the  fathers  at 
Pisa  ;  and  for  years  the  church  and  the  world  were  scandalized 
by  the  intrigues  and  mutual  anathemas  of  three  popes.  Mean- 
while, in  France,  the  Orleanist  party  was  reorganized  under 
the  headship  of  the  Count  d'Armagnac,  by  whose  name  it  was 
subsequently  known  ;  civil  war  broke  out,  and  the  Armagnacs, 
crushed  by  the  Burgundians,  appealed  for  aid  in  their  despair 
to  Henry  IV  of  England.  The  year  following  he  died,  and  his 
son,  Henry  V,  thinking  that  France  in  her  distracted  state  was 
ripe  for  subjugation,  revived  the  obsolete  claims  of  Edward  III, 
and  landed  with  an  army  at  the  mouth  of  the  Seine  in  the 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  113 

summer  of  1415.  The  Armagnacs  now  made  amends  for  their 
disloyalty,  and  almost  entirely  by  themselves  withstood  the 
invader.  The  duke  of  Burgundy  stood  sullenly  aloof,  and  saw 
his  compatriots  worsted  at  Agin  court ;  but  their  ultimate  suc- 
cess was  assured,  for  they  had  identified  their  cause  with  the 
nation's.  The  siege  and  capture  of  Rouen  by  the  English 
monarch  in  the  winter  of  1419,  and  his  imminent  advance  upon 
Paris,  brought  about  a  temporary  cessation  of  party  strife  ;  but 
the  barbarous  murder  of  the  duke  of  Burgundy  at  the  very 
moment  when  reconciliation  seemed  accomplished  plunged  his 
country  into  an  abyss  of  humiliation  ;  for  his  son,  the  young 
Duke  Philip,  opened  his  arms  to  the  English,  and  with  the 
cooperation  of  the  queen,  and  amid  the  plaudits  of  the  people 
of  Paris,  concluded  with  Henry  V  in  the  spring  of  1420  the 
amazing  treaty  of  Troyes,  by  which  the  succession  to  the  throne 
of  France  was  signed  away  to  the  English  king,  to  the  exclu- 
sion of  the  dauphin.  It  was  many  years  before  the  French 
monarchy,  consecrated  anew  by  the  vision,  heroic  action,  and 
piteous  death  of  the  Maid  of  Orleans,  resolved  the  jarring 
notes  of  party  hatred  into  harmony,  and  led  France  slowly  up 
to  power  and  prosperity  again. 

At  the  commencement  of  the  struggle  between  the  Burgun- 
dians  and  the  Armagnacs,  in  the  year  1410,  died  Jean  Frois- 
sart,  the  singer  and  chronicler  of  a  brighter  day  ;  and  a  few 
years  later  another  representative  of  the  French  literature  of  the 
fourteenth  century  passed  away  —  Eustache  Deschamps,  author 
of  innumerable  ballads  and  rondeaus.  Their  younger  contem- 
poraries, Christine  de  Pisan  and  Alain  Chartier,  more  deeply 
impressed  by  the  accumulating  evils  of  the  time,  moralized  in 
prose  and  verse.  Productions  characteristic  of  the  period  were 
prose  works  on  morals  and  manners,  which  laid  down  rules  of 
conduct  and  illustrated  the  effects  of  good  and  bad  behavior. 
But  perhaps  the  most  significant  product  of  the  age  was  the 
"  Morality,"  or  moral-play,  which  made  the  Devil,  the  Vice,  and 


114  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

the  Deadly  Sins  enact  their  parts  upon  the  stage,  and  engaged 
them  in  allegorical  combat  with  the  Virtues.  This  develop- 
ment in  the  drama  becomes  full  of  meaning  when  placed  in  its 
proper  setting,  in  the  period  out  of  which  it  sprang. 

In  spite  of  this  manifest  vitality  of  French  literature,  it  must 
be  admitted  that  the  literary  supremacy  of  the  fourteenth 
century  belonged  to  Italy  and  England  in  turn.  The  names 
of  the  great  English  authors  of  the  last  half  of  that  century 
are  the  only  ones  that  can  be  mentioned  with  those  of  the 
great  Italians  of  the  first  half  without  a  painful  sense  of 
incongruity. 

It  was  during  the  short  reign  of  Henry  V  that  the  schism  in 
the  papacy  was  practically  healed.  The  conscience  of  Europe 
was  thoroughly  roused  by  the  enormity  of  three  popes  excom- 
municating and  vilifying  each  other,  and  was  determined  to 
put  a  stop  to  it.  An  ecumenical  council  —  one  of  the  most 
magnificent  assemblies  that  ever  met  —  was  convened  at 
Constance  in  the  year  1414;  and  then  began  one  of  the 
most  impressive  exhibitions  of  moral  energy  in  the  history  of 
civilization,  —  a  determined  effort  to  reform  abuses,  and  to 
bring  order  out  of  chaos,  the  force  of  which  was  not  spent  for 
more  than  a  generation.  The  deliberations  of  the  council  were 
guided  by  the  eminent  French  doctors,  Gerson  and  D'Ailly. 
Its  first  important  regulation  was  that  the  voting  should  be  by 
nations.  It  asserted  as  a  fundamental  principle  that  the 
authority  of  councils  is  superior  to  that  of  popes.  (Nicholas 
of  Clemanges,  a  learned  Frenchman,  and  a  friend  of  D'Ailly, 
maintained  in  a  pamphlet  published  about  this  time  that  the 
authority  of  the  Bible  is  over  all.)  The  three  contending 
popes  were  unceremoniously  set  aside ;  two  of  them  eventually 
submitted,  but  nothing  could  bend  or  break  the  will  of  the 
Spaniard,  Benedict  XIII,  —  in  whose  favor  a  temporary  diver- 
sion was  made  by  the  Armagnacs,  then  in  power, — and  he 
remained  in  schism  until  his  death. 


OF   ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  115 

Meanwhile,  the  fathers  in  council  proceeded  to  their  task 
of  extirpating  heresy,  which,  they  devoutly  believed,  was 
accountable  for  many  of  the  ills  that  plagued  the  church.  In 
the  severity,  the  injustice,  of  their  procedure,  they  were 
actuated,  doubtless,  by  an  uneasy  sense  that  they  had  gone 
far  along  the  road  of  what  seemed  to  many  startling  innovations 
in  ecclesiastical  polity,  and  that  it  behoved  them  to  vindicate 
their  unimpeachable  orthodoxy.  So  they  made  examples  of 
two  conspicuous  Bohemian  reformers,  John  Huss  and  Jerome 
of  Prague,  who  had  trodden  in  Wyclif 's  footsteps.  The  writings 
of  Wyclif  had  long  been  well  known  in  the  University  of  Prague, 
and  his  opinions  had  been  sown  broadcast  throughout  Bohemia. 
In  his  preaching  Huss  had  inveighed  against  the  wealth,  luxury, 
and  immorality  of  the  clergy,  and  the  abuse  of  indulgences,  — 
but  he  had  gone  no  further ;  at  his  examination  it  was  attempted 
to  entangle  him  in  errors  concerning  the  sacrament  of  the 
altar,  but  touching  that  point  no  fault  could  be  found  in  him. 
Nevertheless  he  was  burnt  at  the  stake. 

Contrary  to  the  desire  of  the  German  delegates,  who  urged 
that  the  promised  reform  of  the  church  "  in  head  and  members  " 
should  next  be  undertaken,  the  council  hastened  the  election 
of  a  new  pope,  and  the  choice  of  the  cardinals  fell  upon  a 
member  of  the  proud  Roman  family  of  Colonna,  who  received 
the  homage  of  the  assembled  fathers  as  Pope  Martin  V. 
Reform  was  bruited  no  more ;  and  after  making  arrangements 
for  a  future  council,  that  of  Constance  was  dismissed  by  the 
new  pontiff  with  fair  words,  in  the  year  1417.  One  little  event 
in  the  session  of  that  last  year — a  contest  for  precedence 
between  the  ambassadors  of  France  and  England  —  is  of 
interest  to  us :  the  Englishman  asserted  his  right  to  precede 
as  the  representative  of  a  nation  that  had  been  converted  to 
Christianity  by  Joseph  of  Arimathea,  years  before  there  were 
any  converts  in  Gaul. 

Benedict  XIII  —  still  maintaining  that  in  him  alone  was  the 


116  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

true  church  —  died  in  the  year  1424,  and  the  little  knot  of 
cardinals  whom  he  had  created,  and  who  remained  faithful  to 
him  to  the  last,  chose  as  his  successor  a  canon  of  Barcelona, 
who  called  himself  Clement  VIII.  For  a  time  he  was  sup- 
ported, on  political  grounds,  by  the  king  of  Aragon ;  but  in 
1428  he  submitted  to  Martin  V  —  and  the  schism  of  half  a 
century  was  healed. 

Terrible  religious  wars  had  broken  out  in  Bohemia  as  a 
result  of  the  mistaken  attitude  of  the  council  of  Constance 
towards  the  reforms  of  Huss.  His  followers  now  went  further 
than  he,  and  demanded  that  in  the  communion  the  cup  should 
be  administered  to  the  laity.  The  revolt  was  quite  beyond  the 
slowly  reviving  papal  power  to  suppress,  and  the  reluctant 
pope  had  to  bow  to  the  decree  of  Constance,  and  summon  a 
council.  It  assembled  at  Basel,  in  1431.  The  above-mentioned 
controversy  over  precedence  was  renewed,  this  time  with  the 
Castilian  ambassador;  arguments  for  and  against  the  mission 
of  Joseph  of  Arimathea  were  brought  forward  on  both  sides, 
the  English  adducing  " many  ancient  testimonies"  —William 
of  Malmesbury's,  doubtless,  among  the  number. 

The  council  of  Basel  met  partly  to  continue,  partly  to  undo, 
whether  for  good  or  evil,  the  work  of  its  predecessor.  It 
reaffirmed  the  supremacy  of  councils  in  ecclesiastical  matters, 
and  succeeded  for  a  season  in  humiliating  the  new  pope, 
Eugenius  IV.  Its  departure  from  the  practice  of  voting  by 
nations,  however,  lost  it  the  adhesion  of  the  English  clergy, 
who  in  convocation  determined  to  obey  the  pope.  The  council 
admitted  a  deputation  from  Bohemia,  and  for  the  sake  of  peace 
acceded  to  its  demands.  It  also  promulgated  certain  reforma- 
tory decrees,  which  were  recognized,  for  a  time  at  least,  in 
France  and  Germany.  But  its  influence  began  steadily  to 
wane  from  the  time  when,  in  its  keen  conflict  with  Eugenius  IV, 
who  had  convened  a  rival  synod,  it  declared  him  deposed,  and 
chose  another  pope.  Europe  was  weary  of  schisms.  The 


OF  ENGLISH  LITER  A  TU. 


council,  weakened  by  defections  to  the  party  of.,  Eugenius, 
removed,  in  1443,  to  Lausanne ;  it  lingered  on,  an  ever- 
diminishing  remnant,  until  1449,  when  it  was  glad  to  accept 
overtures  of  peace  made  by  his  successor,  Nicholas  V.  The 
conciliar  epoch  was  over,  and  the  jubilee  of  1450  celebrated 
the  completion  of  the  papal  restoration. 

An  earnest,  almost  pathetic  reversion  to  the  antique  type  of 
ascetic  piety  accompanied  and  adorned  this  restitution  of  the 
old  ecclesiastical  order.  It  was  an  attempt,  foredoomed  to 
speedy  failure,  to  retrieve  the  mediaeval  ideal  of  life  which  had 
lately  paled  before  the  sunny  ideal  of  the  Renascence.  It  was 
inspired,  without  doubt,  by  a  desire  to  countervail  the  errors  of 
heretical  piety.  Within  a  few  years  after  the  papal  schism 
there  came  into  the  world  a  number  of  pious  souls  that  were 
destined  to  be  powerful  agents  in  the  work  of  Catholic  reforma- 
tion in  the  fifteenth  century.  Bernardino  of  Siena  and  John  of 
Capistrano,  Franciscans,  by  their  self-denying  lives  and  fiery 
preaching  recalled  the  primitive  zeal  of  their  order.  Bernardino 
refused  bishopric  after  bishopric,  believing  that  by  preaching 
from  city  to  city  throughout  Italy  he  could  save  more  souls. 
John  of  Capistrano  preached  at  large  in  Italy,  and  went  on 
missions  into  Germany  and  Austria.  A  French  girl,  Colette 
Boilet,  began  a  reform  in  the  sisterhood  of  St.  Clara,  which 
she  carried  through  successfully  in  the  teeth  of  angry  and 
contemptuous  opposition.  She  won  the  regard  of  Benedict  XIII, 
who  appointed  her  superior  of  her  order.  Her  reformed  rule, 
first  adopted  in  Savoy,  made  its  way  into  Burgundy,  and  at  last 
into  Spain  and  Flanders.  Another  pious  woman,  a  Roman 
widow  named  Francesca,  a  mistress  of  the  art  of  self-mortifica- 
tion, and  endowed  with  the  faculty  of  seeing  visions,  became 
the  founder  of  a  new  order  for  her  sex.  In  the  year  1425  she 
formed  a  convent  which  grew  so  rapidly  in  numbers  and 
reputation  that  in  1437  it  was  erected  into  an  order,  that  of 
Collatines,  by  Eugenius  IV.  The  most  vivid  lights  of  this 


118  OUTLINE   OF  THE  PHILOSOPHY 

ascetic  revival  were  the  sainted  archbishops  of  Florence  and 
Venice,  Antonio,  later  known  as  Antoninus,  and  Lorenzo 
Giustiniani.  The  former  was  indeed  a  noble  soul,  self-denying 
in  the  extreme,  but  lenient  to  others,  a  friend  of  the  poor  and 
the  sick,  an  earnest  preacher.  He  was  a  Dominican,  and 
before  his  elevation  to  the  archbishopric  was  prior  of  the 
monastery  of  San  Marco,  —  among  whose  inmates  in  his  time 
was  the  beatified  painter,  Fra  Angelico  of  Fiesole,  whose 
frescoes  exquisitely  reveal  the  ideal  of  the  devout  spirits  of  his 
day.  Lorenzo  Giustiniani,  a  young  Venetian  nobleman,  had  a 
vision  in  his  nineteenth  year  that  diverted  all  his  thoughts 
from  the  delights  of  a  worldly  life  to  the  monastic  ideal.  He 
tested  his  constancy  by  lying  all  night  on  knotty  sticks,  and  at 
last  fled  to  an  island  monastery  to  avoid  a  match  that  his 
widowed  mother  proposed  for  him,  —  and  never  visited  his 
home  again  until  she  lay  dying.  He  practised  the  utmost 
austerities  that  one  could  endure  and  live.  He  bore  the  heats 
of  summer  without  repining,  hoping  to  escape  the  more  intoler- 
able heat  of  hell,  —  and  in  midwinter  refused  the  comfort  of  a 
fire.  Called  from  his  convent  to  the  bishopric  of  Venice,  the 
greatest  luxury  he  permitted  himself  in  his  new  state  was  a  bed 
of  straw.  From  the  first,  his  zeal  in  the  performance  of  his 
new  duties,  his  cogent  preaching,  his  self-immolating  spirit, 
made  the  breath  of  a  fresh  spiritual  life  felt  throughout  his 
populous  diocese,  and  churches  and  religious  institutions  were 
multiplied.  The  last  eminent  exponent  of  this  Catholic  reforma- 
tion was  Francis  of  Paula,  on  the  Calabrian  coast.  He  was 
much  younger  than  the  men  and  women  just  noticed,  having 
been  born  at  the  very  close  of  the  papal  schism.  At  the  age 
of  fifteen  years  he  began  a  hermit's  life  in  a  cavern  by  the  sea. 
Gradually  a  little  community  gathered  around  him;  in  1454  a 
church  and  monastery  were  erected ;  and  erelong  the  brother- 
hood obtained  the  pope's  approval  as  the  order  of  Friars 
Minims.  Francis  visited  Sicily,  Naples,  and  Rome,  and  passed 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  119 

on  urgent  invitation  into  France,  where  he  became  spiritual 
adviser  to  three  successive  kings. 

The  English  kings  of  the  House  of  Lancaster  were  involved 
in  the  perplexities  and  miseries  of  the  age  of  schisms ;  it  was 
left  for  the  rival  House  of  York  to  participate  in  the  general 
restoration  of  order  throughout  Europe  by  sovereign  authority. 
Perhaps  the  most  memorable  circumstance  connected  with  the 
history  of  the  Lancastrian  line  is  the  decided  increase  of  power 
that  parliament  then  enjoyed.  Freedom  of  debate  was  con- 
ceded to  it,  and  its  right  to  determine  the  privileges  of  its 
members  was  recognized.  It  guarded  the  public  expenditure, 
and  exercised  control  even  over  the  royal  household.  These 
facts  are  to  be  viewed  in  their  relation  to  the  significant  fact 
that  the  House  of  Lancaster  held  by  parliamentary  title  purely ; 
not  to  Henry  IV  but  to  the  young  Edmund  Mortimer  did  the 
crown  belong  by  hereditary  right. 

Henry's  foreign  policy  was,  naturally,  a  reversal  of  that  of 
Richard  II ;  at  her  father's  demand,  Richard's  child-widow, 
Isabella,  was  sent  back  to  France,  —  but  without  her  dowry; 
and  the  treaty  between  the  two  kingdoms  was  ruptured.  Henry 
did  not  live  long  enough  to  take  advantage  to  the  full  of  his 
neighbor's  intestinal  conflicts ;  for  great  part  of  his  reign  he 
was  kept  busy  at  home  by  warfare  upon  the  Scotch  and  Welsh 
borders,  and  by  the  menacing  attitude  of  the  Earl  of  Northum- 
berland, head  of  the  great  family  of  the  Percys,  chief  repre- 
sentatives of  the  feudal  nobility  of  that  day,  who,  having  been 
largely  instrumental  in  raising  Henry  to  the  throne,  conceived 
a  grudge  against  him,  and,  fired  with  the  ambition  of  a  king- 
maker, conspired  to  dispossess  him,  and  bestow  the  crown 
upon  Mortimer.  On  three  several  occasions  Northumberland 
rose  in  arms  against  his  liege  ;  on  the  last  of  these,  in  the  year 
1408,  he  met  his  death,  —  but  his  ally,  Owen  Glendower,  still 
held  out  in  North  Wales. 

Scotland  had  her  full  share  of  the  portentous  crimes  and 


120  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

vicissitudes  of  those  dark  times.  Her  well-intentioned  but 
weak  king,  Robert  III,  resigned  the  conduct  of  affairs  to  his 
ambitious  brother,  whom,  in  the  year  1398,  he  created  duke 
of  Albany.  David,  heir-apparent  to  the  crown,  a  worthless 
young  man,  was  done  to  death  by  his  uncle's  orders  in  Falkland 
Castle,  and  Robert,  fearful  of  the  safety  of  his  remaining  son, 
James,  sought  a  refuge  for  him  in  France  —  but  on  his  way 
thither,  in  1405,  the  young  prince  was  intercepted  by  the 
English,  and  was  lodged  in  the  Tower  of  London.  This  last 
blow  broke  his  father's  heart. 

By  the  year  1411,  Henry  found  himself  in  condition  to 
interfere  cautiously  in  the  strife  of  Burgundian  and  Armagnac, 
—  but  now  his  health  began  to  fail:  he  was  subject  to  attacks 
of  epilepsy,  and  early  in  the  spring  of  1413  he  died,  leaving  to 
his  spirited  son  (with  what  success  we  know)  the  prosecution 
of  his  designs  upon  unhappy  France. 

Henry  V  was  detained  by  an  alarming  demonstration  on  the 
part  of  the  Lollards,  and  by  a  plot  to  overthrow  his  government 
and  raise  Mortimer  to  the  throne,  before  he  could  make  his 
descent  upon  the  French  coast,  and  emulate,  even  outdo  the 
achievements  of  his  illustrious  ancestor,  Edward  III.  The 
glories  of  his  brief  reign  were  too  transient  to  initiate  a  new 
literary  epoch,  to  do  more  than  cast  a  passing  gleam  athwart 
the  sombre  history  of  his  house ;  his  dazzling  successes  left  his 
infant  son  only  a  heritage  of  disaster.  The  story  of  Henry  VI's 
long  reign  is,  outwardly,  that  of  the  slow  decay  of  English 
power  in  France ;  inwardly,  of  misgovernment  verging  upon 
anarchy,  degenerating  at  last  into  civil  war.  For  a  few  years 
all  went  well :  Humphrey,  duke  of  Gloucester,  brother  of  the 
late  king,  was  appointed  by  parliament  protector  of  the  realm, 
and  his  elder  brother  John,  duke  of  Bedford,  regent  in  France. 
A  politic  act  of  the  new  government  was  the  liberation  of  the 
Scottish  king,  James  I,  after  his  long  detention  of  more  than 
eighteen  years  ;  he  pledged  himself  to  preserve  peace  with 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  121 

England,  and  the  treaty  was  cemented  by  his  marriage  with 
the  Lady  Joan  Beaufort,  —  a  cousin  of  Henry  V.  Thus  the 
French  lost  a  useful  ally.  James  returned  to  his  native  land 
in  the  spring  of  1424  to  begin  administrative  and  legal  reforms 
that  promised  to  open  a  new  era  of  order  and  prosperity  in  his 
distracted  kingdom  —  but  his  enlightened  designs  were  cut 
short  by  his  barbarous  assassination  in  the  year  1437. 

For  the  first  five  years  of  Bedford's  able  regency  the  prestige 
of  the  English  arms  continued  unabated  :  it  was  even  enhanced 
by  the  battle  of  Verneuil  in  1427  — a  victory  that  recalled  the 
palmy  days  of  Henry  V.  But  in  the  same  year  the  young 
French  patriot  Dunois  achieved  his  first  conspicuous  success 
at  Montargis  —  the  first  of  a  series  of  solid  though  not  brilliant 
successes  that  resulted  after  many  years  in  the  utter  discom- 
fiture of  the  English  and  their  expulsion  from  reconstituted 
France.  In  1428,  Bedford  began  his  ill-fated  siege  of  Orleans; 
the  city  was  defended  by  Dunois  and  succoured  by  Joan  of 
Arc :  her  vision  and  his  steadfastness  regenerated  the  nation. 
From  that  time  the  tide  of  English  power  began  steadily  to 
ebb,  and  the  decline  was  rather  accelerated  than  stayed  by  the 
Maid's  pitiable  martyrdom  at  Rouen.  Bedford's  death  in  1435 
broke  the  last  tie  that  bound  the  duke  of  Burgundy  to  the 
English  cause,  and  he  made  his  peace  with  the  French  king, 
who  shortly  after  recovered  his  capital  of  Paris. 

Meantime,  at  home,  there  was  angry  contention  between 
Humphrey  of  Gloucester  and  his  uncle,  the  cardinal-bishop  of 
Winchester,  —  one  standing  for  a  continuance  of  the  war,  the 
other  for  peace.  The  logic  of  events,  and  such  influence  as 
the  meek  young  king  was  able  to  exert,  favored  the  latter  policy, 
and  in  1444  a  truce  was  agreed  upon  with  France,  which  was 
signalized  the  next  year  by  Henry's  marriage  with  Margaret, 
daughter  of  Rene  of  Anjou.  By  a  secret  article  in  the 
treaty  the  English  possessions  in  Maine  and  Anjou  were 
restored  to  the  new  queen's  family. 


122  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

In  this  interval  of  quiet,  Charles  VII  carried  out  an  extremely 
important  measure,  —  the  formation  of  a  standing  army  ;  and 
in  1449  he  seized  the  first  opportunity  that  offered  to  resume 
the  war.  He  sent  Dunois  into  Normandy,  and  town  after  town 
submitted  to  him;  in  1450,  Cherbourg,  the  last  possession  of 
the  English  in  that  quarter,  was  wrested  from  them. 

These  disheartening  reverses,  and  the  waste  of  taxation  in 
prosecuting  so  unfortunate  a  war,  added  to  the  unpopularity  of 
Queen  Margaret,  the  suspicion  engendered  by  the  cession  of 
Maine,  and  the  penury  and  monstrous  indebtedness  of  the 
crown,  caused  great  commotion  in  England ;  a  popular  insur- 
rection broke  out  that  resembled  that  of  1381.  The  general 
discontent  was  not  allayed  when  in  1451  Dunois  overran 
Guienne.  The  year  following,  Richard,  duke  of  York,  heir  to 
the  royal  claim  of  the  house  of  Mortimer,  as  if  representing 
the  national  will,  demanded  a  reform  in  the  government.  A 
temporary  diversion  was  made  in  favor  of  the  English  in 
Guienne,  —  but  in  1453  the  troops  of  Charles  VII  closed 
round  them  again  ;  they  were  driven  from  Bordeaux  and 
Bayonne,  and  Calais  with  its  environs  remained  the  last  shred 
of  their  French  possessions. 

These  disasters  deranged  King  Henry's  feeble  intellect,  and 
parliament  appointed  the  duke  of  York  protector  of  the  realm. 
But  about  Christmas-tide,  1454,  Henry  enjoyed  a  restoration 
of  reason,  and  Richard  was  deprived  of  his  authority.  He 
forthwith  raised  an  army,  and  met  and  defeated  the  royal 
forces  at  St.  Alban's  in  May,  1455,  taking  the  king  himself 
captive.  This  was  the  first  of  a  long  series  of  sanguinary 
battles  in  which  victory  almost  invariably  inclined  to  the  side 
of  the  Yorkists,  and  in  which  the  genius  of  feudalism  was 
extinguished. 

Again  his  troubles  disordered  Henry's  understanding,  and 
again  the  duke  of  York  was  made  protector.  In  1456  the 
king  recovered,  and  a  hollow  reconciliation  of  the  contending 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  123 

parties  was  effected ;  for  a  few  years  an  ominous  quiet  was 
preserved.  But  in  1459  the  inevitable  conflict  between  a  wan- 
ing and  a  rising  cause  broke  out  afresh  :  the  Yorkists  were 
victorious  at  Bloreheath,  and  the  next  year  at  Northampton ; 
and  the  duke's  title  to  the  crown  was  admitted  by  the  Lords. 
The  inflexible  Margaret,  however,  gathered  an  army  in  the 
north  and  won  a  victory  at  Wakefield ;  Richard  fell  in  the  bat- 
tle, and  his  head,  contemptuously  circled  with  a  paper  crown, 
was  stuck  upon  the  walls  of  York.  His  son  Edward,  now 
duke,  a  good  soldier,  though  but  nineteen  years  of  age,  partly 
avenged  his  death  at  the  battle  of  Mortimer's  Cross,  in  the 
winter  of  1461,  and  marching  straightway  to  London  mounted 
the  throne,  amid  the  rejoicings  of  the  citizens,  as  King  Edward 
IV.  Immediately  after,  in  conjunction  with  his  cousin,  the 
Earl  of  Warwick,  he  established  his  power  by  a  fearful  slaughter 
of  the  Lancastrians  on  the  field  of  Towton. 

The  poetry  of  the  Lancastrian  period  was  affected  by  the 
evil  fortunes  of  the  House.  It  presents  to  our  view  the  grad- 
ual decay  of  the  literary  enthusiasm  inherited  from  the  four- 
teenth century.  It  is  afflicted  with  the  garrulity  and  prolixity 
of  age  ;  and  a  deadly  blight  steals  over  it  with  the  increasing 
disorders  of  Henry  VI's  hopeless  reign.  The  most  attractive 
quality  of  the  representative  poets  of  the  age  is,  perhaps,  their 
reverent  affection  for  the  memory  of  Chaucer,  but  their  linger- 
ing didacticism  gives  evidence  that  they  derived  more  from 
Gower,  —  whose  name  they  constantly  coupled  with  Chaucer's. 
Among  their  most  characteristic  and  readable  verses  are  their 
confessions  of  a  wasted  youth  ;  the  emotion  of  regret  and 
penitence  in  these  has  a  ring  of  sincerity  that  makes  them 
start  out  from  the  mass  of  mediocre  and  imitative  versification 
in  which  they  are  imbedded. 

John  Lydgate,  monk  and  scholar,  illustrates  well  the  back- 
ward look,  the  longing  to  have  walked  and  talked  with  Chaucer, 
that  was  his  finest  inspiration,  in  the  prologue  to  his  volumi- 


124  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

nous  "  Story -of  Thebes."  He  offers  it  to  us  as  the  last  of  the 
Canterbury  tales.  He  pictures  himself  as  riding  in  his  black 
cope  on  a  slender  palfrey  with  a  rusty  bridle,  to  visit  the  shrine 
of  St.  Thomas,  and  perform  his  vows  after  a  recovery  from 
sickness.  It  befell  that  he  entered  the  town  soon  after  Chaucer 
and  his  pilgrims  had  arrived  there,  and  that  he  sought  enter- 
tainment at  the  very  inn  where  they  were.  The  Host 
demanded  his  name,  and  invited  him  to  join  his  party ;  the 
following  morning,  when  they  were  a  bow-shot  out  of  town, 
he  called  on  Lydgate  not  to  preach,  but  to  tell  a  tale,  "of 
effect  of  joy  "  : 

4<  And  as  I  coude,  with  a  pale  chere, 
My  tale  I  gan  anone,  as  ye  shal  here." 

It  is  the  story  of  CEdipus,  and  of  the  unbrotherly  struggle  of 
"  Ethiocles  and  Polimite."  It  was  a  parable  for  its  author's 
own  times  ;  despite  the  Host's  precaution,  Lydgate  concealed 
under  the  sweetness  of  rhyme  a  homiletic  motive  ;  at  the  con- 
clusion of  the  tale  he  expresses  his  conviction  that  Lucifer  is 
the  originator  of  war. 

That  mixture  of  Christian  and  classic,  that  vision  of  antiquity 
through  the  medium  of  chivalry,  which  was  so  characteristic 
of  the  Renascence,  is  exhibited  in  this  and  other  of  Lyd- 
gate's  works.  The  compromise  between  the  royal  brothers 
by  which  they  agree  to  reign  in  alternate  years  is  confirmed 
by  "othe  of  Sacrament."  Tydeus  is  the  best  knight  of  the 
world  ;  at  his  marriage  all  the  Barons  are  present.  When  they 
prepare  for  war,  the  worthy  Bishop  Amphiorax  prophesies  a 
terrible  slaughter  of  princes.  Lydgate's  "Testament"  opens 
with  praise  of  the  name  of  Jesus,  —  who  brought  many  souls 
out  of  hell,  in  spite  of  Cerberus ;  he  is  our  Samson,  our 
Orpheus. 

The  piece  last  mentioned  continues  with  a  pretty  but  con- 
ventional description  of  spring,  to  which  childhood  is  compared, 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  125 

and  thus  a  transition  is  effected  to  the  main  business  of  the 
poem — a  piteous  disburdening  of  a  sensitive  conscience  by  a 
confession  of  youthful  shortcoming  for  which  Jesus'  absolution 
is  implored.  As  a  boy  the  poet  was  headstrong  and  loath  to 
learn  ;  late  at  school,  chattering  and  trifling,  he  would  forge  a 
lie  to  cover  up  a  fault.  He  stole  apples  ;  no  hedge  or  wall 
restrained  him  ;  he  was  readier  to  pluck  grapes  off  other  men's 
vines  than  to  say  matins.  He  was  a  wanton  ape,  scoffing  and 
scorning ;  he  misused  his  five  senses,  —  and  would  sooner 
count  cherry-stones  than  go  to  church  or  hear  the  sacring  bell. 
He  was  loath  to  get  up  in  the  morning,  to  go  to  bed  at  night. 
He  was  the  bell-wether  of  truants.  After  he  had  entered  the 
monastic  life,  like  Lot's  wife  he  often  looked  back.  He  took 
little  heed  of  Benedict's  rule,  wore  a  black  habit  and  was 
a  counterfeit,  was  disobedient,  intemperate,  the  last  at  choir  — 
until  one  day  he  saw  a  crucifix  painted  on  a  cloister-wall  and 
beside  it  the  single  word  VIDE.  From  the  impression  at  that 
moment  received  he  dated  his  conversion. 

For  Henry  V,  Lydgate  composed  a  version  of  the  tale  of 
Troy  —  a  popular  subject,  as  we  have  seen,  among  readers  who 
traced  the  history  of  their  island  up  to  a  king  of  Trojan 
descent.  For  Humphrey,  duke  of  Gloucester,  he  composed 
another  long  poem,  "  The  Falls  of  Princes,"  based  upon 
Boccaccio's  work  :  a  politico-moral  subject  appropriate  to  the 
age.  In  the  writings  of  his  French  contemporary  also,  the 
didactic  Alain  Chartier,  Lydgate  found  a  congenial  spirit 

Bred  in  an  age  of  schisms,  of  extraordinary  vicissitudes,  it 
is  no  wonder  that  he  was  profoundly  impressed  by  the  muta- 
bility of  the  world,  the  instability  of  human  affairs.  "All 
stands  in  change  like  a  midsummer  rose  "  is  the  refrain  of  one 
of  his  poems  ;  and  of  another,  "  All  worldly  thinge  turneth  as 
a  ball."  Fortune  and  her  wheel  play  a  leading  part  in  his 
drama  of  life  ;  universal  history  seems  to  him  simply  the  record 
of  her  caprices  :  where  are  Pyrrhus,  Alexander,  and  Seneca, 


126  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

he  cries,  where  Rome  and  Carthage?  —  it  is  as  Fortune  would  : 
she  is  the  disposer.  She  is  a  great  goddess,  the  empress  of 
this  world,  —  that  is  why  it  is  so  variable.  Death  casts  down 
princes  from  her  wheel :  witness  the  fate  of  Absalom,  Hector, 
Caesar,  Belshazzar,  Henry  V.  A  curious  piece,  of  contraries 
all  compact,  gives  one  the  impression  of  a  mind  confused, 
without  a  clue  to  the  labyrinth  of  life,  helpless  before  the 
riddle  of  the  world,  its  oppositions,  difficulties,  and  disappoint- 
ments :  "  The  more  I  go,  the  further  behind  I  am  ;  the  more  I 
seek,  the  less  can  I  find ;  the  longer  I  serve,  the  more  out  of 
mind  :  is  this  fortune,  or  is  it  infortune  ?  A  weary  peace,  and 
peace  amid  the  war ;  a  weeping  laughter,  a  merry  glad  weep- 
ing ;  the  more  I  run,  the  more  way  I  lose ;  is  this  fortune,  or 
is  it  infortune  ?  A  troubled  joy,  a  joyful  heaviness ;  a  sobbing 
song,  a  cheerful  distress ;  trusty  deceit,  faithful  deception  ; 
now  light,  now  heavy,  now  sorrow,  now  gladness  :  how  escape 
these  puzzling  contrarieties  ?  By  faith  in  God  ;  Christ's  pas- 
sion shall  reclaim  us  in  spite  of  false  fortune."  Elsewhere  he 
explains  that  there  can  be  no  "  steadfast  living  "  for  man,  made 
as  he  is  of  the  four  elements,  of  four  humors  that  alter  with 
the  seasons  ;  in  the  midst  of  this  perpetual  change  it  is  a 
relief  to  lift  one's  eyes  to  the  constant  heavens,  to  think  of  the 
Lord  who  is  eternal,  who  sits  so  far  above  the  seven  stars  in 
his  most  imperial  palace. 

Lydgate's  didactic  vein  crops  out  with  exceeding  plainness 
in  his  "Dietary,"  or  Rules  for  Preserving  Health,  —  a  com- 
pend  of  popular  philosophy  :  "  Rise  from  meat  with  an  appe- 
tite .  .  .  don't  grumble  at  meals  .  .  .  beware  of  rear-suppers  ! 
.  .  .  don't  drink  between  meals  .  .  .  too  much  salt  meat  is 
injurious  to  delicate  stomachs  ...  be  moderate  in  diet,  have 
compassion  on  the  needy,  and  live  at  peace  with  all  men."  One 
of  the  best  of  his  short  poems  is  his  "  Counsel  to  an  old  man 
on  marriage  with  a  young  wife,"  in  which  he  answers  the  old 
man's  arguments  for  such  marriage.  Another,  "  On  the  horned 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  127 

head-dresses  of  ladies,"  is  a  dissuasive  from  an  extravagant 
fashion  of  the  day.  In  pieces  like  these  one  can  mark  the 
natural  and  easy  transition  from  a  didactic  to  a  satirical  spirit 
and  style, — exemplified  in  a  fable  of  two  cows,  Chychevache 
and  Bycorne,  the  first  of  which  feeds  on  debonair  wives  and  is 
lean,  the  last  on  patient  husbands,  and  is  fat ;  in  the  well- 
known  ballad,  *  London  Lickpenny,'  which  gives  us  an  enter- 
taining glimpse  into  the  streets  of  the  capital  in  that  far-off 
day  ;  and  in  an  ironical  rhyme  in  which  the  poet  returns  to  the 
charge  against  his  times  :  the  world  is  stable  —  princes  are 
righteous  —  knights  true  —  priests  perfect  —  "  even  as  the  crab 
goeth  forward  "  ;  law  is  incorruptible  —  there  's  no  envy  in 
cloisters  —  laborers  are  never  idle  —  women  have  banished 
new-fangledness  —  the  hungry  are  fed,  the  naked  clothed  — 
heretics  have  left  their  frowardness —  and  all 's  "as  straight  as 
a  ram's  horn." 

In  the  collection  of  Lydgate's  minor  poems  may  be  found 
one,  a  love-poem,  to  the  authorship  of  which  he  assuredly  can 
lay  no  claim.  It  is  known  that  many  fugitive  pieces  of  the 
fifteenth  century  were  attributed  to  him  ;  and  there  is  evidence 
that  some  anonymous  songs  and  ballads  of  that  time  were 
written  by  women.  The  subject  of  the  poem  referred  to  is 
"  A  Maiden's  Complaint"  ;  in  it  we  read,  without  question,  a 
woman's  heart  ;  it  is  eloquent  with  passionate  yet  delicate 
feeling.  "We  played  and  gathered  flowers  in  the  mead 
together  as  children,  he  and  I,  —  and  love  then  gave  me  for 
my  reward  a  knot  in  heart  of  remembrance  that  will  never 
come  undone.  And  yet  I  have  set  my  heart  where,  in  all 
likelihood,  I  shall  never  find  favor,  so  great  is  the  difference 
between  his  manhood  and  my  simpleness.  I  shall  love  him 
best  notwithstanding  :  would  to  God  that  he  knew  the  truth, 
how  often  I  sigh  for  his  sake  !  His  countenance,  his  figure, 
his  bearing  are  ever  present  in  my  sight ;  in  his  absence  I  can 
never  be  happy,  without  his  love  I  can  never  be  at  rest.  He 


128  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

is  and  has  been  from  my  tender  years  my  chosen  knight,  though 
he  knows  it  not.  Imprinted  in  my  inward  thought  until  I  die, 
he  shall  never  depart  out  of  my  heart,  whose  only  solace  is 
waking  or  sleeping  to  dream  of  him." 

One  of  the  finest  ballads  of  the  fifteenth  century  (though 
the  first  draught  of  it  we  possess  is  an  inferior  version  of  a 
later  age)  is  that  of  "  Chevy  Chase,"  — an  account  of  the  bold 
Lord  Percy's  hunting-party  upon  the  Cheviot  Hills,  in  the 
midst  of  which  he  is  encountered  by  the  Douglas  and  his  men; 
the  rival  champions  fall  in  deadly  combat,  and  a  frightful 
slaughter  ensues.  It  is  impossible  to  fix  the  date  of  this  event, 
so  contradictory  are  the  historical  allusions  in  the.  poem ; 
it  seems  like  a  confused  echo  of  several  border  battles.  It 
presents  to  our  minds  a  vivid  picture  of  the  lawlessness  and 
bloodshed,  the  ferocity  relieved  with  rare  touches  of  magna- 
nimity, that  characterized  those  turbulent  times.  It  is  an  epic 
in  miniature. 

In  Lydgate's  day  Moralities,  or  Moral-plays,  were  introduced 
into  England  ;  three  specimens  of  such  plays,  known  to  belong 
to  the  reign  of  Henry  VI,  are  still  extant. 

For  the  canons  of  St.  Paul's,  London,  Lydgate  composed  a 
version  of  the  "  Dance  of  Death,"  to  be  illustrated  by  designs 
upon  the  cloister  wall.  The  grotesque  subject  was  exceedingly 
popular  at  that  epoch,  in  both  verse  and  painting,  throughout 
Christendom.  For  the  abbot  of  St.  Albans  he  wrote  a  met- 
rical life  of  the  patron  saint  of  that  ancient  and  celebrated 
monastery. 

Lydgate  was  still  living,  at  an  advanced  age,  in  the  year 
1446.  About  that  time,  Osbern  of  Bokenham,  Norfolk,  an 
Augustinian  friar,  wrote  in  unpolished  verse  a  set  of  lives  of 
famous  female  saints  for  some  noble  ladies,  his  patronesses. 
Thomas  Occleve,  a  close  contemporary  of  Lydgate's,  less  of  a 
poet  than  he  but  more  of  one  than  Osbern,  seems  like  a 
shadow  of  the  stronger  master  in  his  devotion  to  Chaucer, 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  129 

his  retrospective,  moralizing  vein,  his  depressing  sense  of  the 
uncertainty  of  things,  his  diffuse  and  prolix  style.  In  a  short 
poem,  "La  Male  Regie"  (Mis-Rule)  he  makes  melancholy 
confession  of  youthful  indiscretions,  which  have  brought  him 
to  poverty  and  sickness.  Youthful  lusts  led  him  astray ;  now 
he  would  return  to  obedience.  Venus'  family  enticed  him, 
wine  and  "  thick  wafers  "  ;  he  was  a  tavern-haunter.  He  would 
go  to  bed  full  of  liquor,  and  rise  late  :  he  was  a  mirror  of  riot. 
He  paid  the  taverners  and  cooks  at  Westminster  gate  just  what 
they  asked,  and  so  was  taken  for  a  "very  gentleman  "  ;  thence 
home  by  water  he  would  pay  the  boatmen  well  and  be  called 
"  master,"-  — oh  treacherous  flattery  !  Erelong  his  purse  grew 
light, —  excess  exiled  the  coin.  Then  came  sickness  to  restrain 
his  indulgence,  and  he  found  himself  in  debt.  The  poem  ends 
with  an  invocation  to  the  god  of  health,  and  in  significant 
proximity  to  it  is  another  "Au  Roy,"  piteously  entreating  a 
flood  of  royal  largess  to  relieve  his  distress.  Confession  and 
petition  are  repeated  in  his  long  poem,  "  The  Governail  of 
Princes,"  dedicated  to  Henry  V.  This  is  a  free  rendering  of 
a  mediaeval  Latin  treatise  ;  it  is  an  "  art  of  government,"  — 
another  of  those  politico-moral  subjects  adapted  to  the  time. 
In  the  lengthy  introduction  he  prefixed  to  it,  Occleve  bemoans 
the  mutations  of  the  world,  the  inroads  of  heresy,  the  extrav- 
agance of  fashion,  — and  the  irregular  payment  of  his  annuity, 
by  which  he  is  sometimes  reduced  to  great  straits ;  he  pays  a 
touching  tribute  to  Chaucer's  memory,  which  he  echoes  in  the 
body  of  the  work.  He  lived  long  enough  to  direct  his  worship 
to  the  rising  sun  of  York ;  in  an  address,  doubtless  to  the 
Duke  Richard,  which  must  have  been  composed  about  the  year 
1449,  he  recommends  himself  to  the  Princess  his  wife  and  to 
Prince  Edward,  and  prays  the  Trinity  for  a  thousand  years  of 
happiness  for  them  all. 

In  Scotland,  the  literary  impulse  exerted  by  John  Barbour 
had  effect  early  in  the  fifteenth  century  in  a  rhymed  history, 


130  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

"  The  Oryginale  Cronykil  of  Scotland,"  written  by  Andrew  of 
Wyntoun,  prior  of  St.  Serf's  monastery,  Loch  Leven.  It  is  in 
nine  books,  "in  honor  of  the  nine  orders  of  angels,"  and  was 
called  "  Original "  because  it  began  with  the  creation.  It 
extends  to  the  death  of  Robert  III,  in  1406. 

Of  Chaucer's  immediate  followers  the  Scottish  king,  James 
I,  was  the  most  poetical.  None  made  the  master's  works  the 
subject  of  more  loving  study,  —  none  so  thoroughly  assimilated 
their  spirit.  His  main  poem,  "  The  King's  Quair  "  (or  Book), 
is  written  in  Chaucer's  stanza,  and  abounds  in  reminiscences 
of  his  works,  —  but  it  is  the  story  of  his  love  —  a  love  that  had 
a  happy  ending,  —  and  the  personal  element  in  it  is  strong  and 
fresh  enough  to  redeem  it  fully  from  the  charge  of  mediocre 
imitation.  It  was  composed  toward  the  close  of  his  English 
captivity. 

The  poet-king  pictures  himself  reading  Boethius,  and  medi- 
tating on  Fortune's  inexplicable  power,  the  insecurity  of  earthly 
enjoyment,  and  his  own  loss  of  liberty.  Looking  from  his 
window  (in  Windsor  Castle)  into  a  fair  garden  below  he  hears 
the  birds  sing  hymns  to  Love,  and  wonders  what  this  Love  is. 
Looking  again,  he  sees  a  lovely  lady  walking  in  the  garden 
with  her  maids  :  is  she  the  very  goddess  Nature  ?  He  prays  to 
Venus,  and  calls  on  the  nightingale  to  sing,  —  but  the  lady  goes 
her  way,  and  his  day  is  turned  to  night.  Suddenly  a  mystic 
light  streams  in  at  the  window,  and  he  is  caught  up  to  the 
lovers'  heaven,  —  Venus  has  heard  his  prayer,  and  receives  him 
graciously.  She  sends  him,  with  Good  Hope  as  guide,  to 
Minerva,  who,  on  examination,  finds  that  his  love  is  virtuous, 
gives  him  good  advice  (quoting  Ecclesiastes),  and  instructs  him 
in  the  doctrine  of  Necessity  and  Free-Will.  The  lover  then 
descends  to  earth,  and  finds  himself  in  a  delicious  garden  along 
a  river  running  clear  and  cold  over  golden  gravel  ;  he  marks 
the  fishes  that  leap  and  play  in  its  waters,  their  scales  glittering 
in  the  sun  like  fine  mail,  —  the  rows  of  trees  laden  with  delec- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  131 

table  fruit  along  its  banks,  —  and  the  divers  animals  that  roam 
around.  At  last  he  discovers  a  spot  encircled  with  a  wall,  and 
within  it  the  great  goddess  Fortune  and  her  wheel,  under  which 
is  an  ugly  pit  that  never  gives  up  again  those  who  fall  into  it ; 
a  crowd  of  folk  cling  to  the  wheel,  some  rising  on  it,  some 
almost  dropping  from  it,  some  violently  flung  off.  The  god- 
dess sets  him  on  it,  and  pinches  his  ear  so  sharply  that  he 
wakes  from  his  dream.  Going  once  more  to  his  window,  a 
turtle-dove  bearing  a  branch  lights  on  his  hand  —  a  favorable 
omen  ;  and  he  blesses  Fortune's  axle-tree  and  wheel  that  have 
whirled  him  so  well.  The  poem  ends,  as  was  customary,  with 
an  envoy,  and  a  reference  to  the  "  superlative  poets,"  Gower 
and  Chaucer,  whose  souls  its  royal  author  commends  to  the 
bliss  of  heaven  in  a  line  that  haunts  the  ear  with  a  fine,  far-off, 
aeolian  melody  such  as  distinguishes  mediaeval  poetry  at  its 
best;  he  who  has  never  caught  it  has  missed  an  exquisite 
satisfaction,  a  pure  and  humanizing  pleasure. 

A  very  important  strain  of  thought  that  gave  tone  to  the 
whole  Lancastrian  period  to  a  degree  scarcely  appreciated  even 
by  students  was  that  of  the  followers  of  Wyclif.  During  the 
reign  of  Richard  II  they  increased  so  rapidly  in  numbers  that 
an  ecclesiastical  annalist  could  assert  that  "  they  were  multi- 
plied like  suckers  from  the  root  of  a  tree  and  everywhere  filled 
the  compass  of  the  kingdom,  insomuch  that  a  man  could  not 
meet  two  people  on  the  road  but  one  of  them  was  a  disciple  of 
Wyclif."  The  accession  «of  the  House  of  Lancaster  was  inaus- 
picious to  their  cause  ;  Henry  IV  sought  to  strengthen  his  pre- 
carious title  by  any  means,  principally  by  courting  the  favor  of 
the  clergy,  and  this  he  found  could  be  most  surely  gained  by 
oppressing  the  Lollards.  Hence  the  famous  statute  of  the  year 
1400  empowered  a  bishop  to  arrest  any  person  suspected  of 
holding  heretical  opinions,  to  try  him,  and  if  convicted, 
imprison  him  at  pleasure  ;  and  if,  having  recanted,  he  after- 
ward relapsed,  to  deliver  him  to  the  sheriff  to  be  burnt.  John 


132  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

Purvey,  the  reviser  of  Wyclif's  Bible,  bowed  before  the  storm 
and  abjured  his  heresy  ;  but  a  martyr  to  the  cause  was  soon 
found  in  William  Sautrey,  a  priest  in  London,  upon  whom  the 
awful  sentence  of  deposition  was  accordingly  carried  out. 
Paten,  chalice,  and  chasuble  were  taken  from  him,  in  token  of 
his  degradation  from  the  priesthood ;  New  Testament  and 
lectionary,  alb  and  stole,  taper  and  church-keys  —  symbols  of 
the  diaconate  —  were  next  taken  away  ;  and  clad  in  the  simple 
habit  of  a  layman  he  was  led  to  the  stake  and  burnt  alive. 
Thus  was  consummated  the  first  legalized  murder  for  con- 
science' sake  in  England.  In  1407  another  priest,  William 
Thorpe,  was  convicted  of  holding  Lollards'  opinions,  and  was 
imprisoned  :  what  finally  became  of  him  is  not  known.  In 
1410,  Thomas  Badby,  a  smith,  found  in  error  concerning  the 
capital  point  of  transubstantiation,  was  burnt  to  death.  And 
yet,  meanwhile,  the  parliament  of  the  land  was  sufficiently 
tinctured  with  Wyclif's  opinions  concerning  church  property  to 
propose  the  seizure  of  some  of  it.  Archbishop  Chichely  actually 
encouraged  Henry  V  in  his  warlike  projects  in  order  to  divert 
the  attention  of  the  people  from  these  questions.  The  rising 
of  the  persecuted  Lollards  at  the  beginning  of  that  king's  reign 
has  been  already  mentioned  ;  their  patron  Oldcastle,  a  noble- 
man, was  marked  out  as  a  distinguished  victim,  —  but  he 
escaped  from  prison,  and  was  not  apprehended  and  put  to 
death  until  four  years  later. 

The  decrees  of  the  Council  of  Constance  stirred  in  England 
fresh  efforts  to  extirpate  heresy.  Wyclif's  ashes  were  dug  up 
and  vindictively  cast  into  the  brook  that  flows  by  Lutterworth. 
An  Inquisition  was  established,  with  Thomas  Netter  —  con- 
fessor to  Henry  V,  and  a  stalwart  defender  of  orthodoxy  —  at 
its  head.  The  learned  John  Capgrave,  provincial  of  the  English 
branch  of  the  Augustinian  order,  author  of  a  lost  life  of  St. 
Gilbert,  preserves  in  his  English  chronicle  many  curious  items 
concerning  the  Lollards  which  reveal  beside  his  blind  and 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  133 

bitter  prejudice  against  the  sect.     His  chronicle  ends  about  this 
time,  though  he  lived  on  to  hail  the  accession  of  Edward  IV. 

In  1419,  several  Lollards  were  constrained  to  alter  their 
views.  In  1424,  two  wandering  priests  were  brought  back  to 
the  fold.  The  same  year,  James  I  returned  to  Scotland  — 
which  was  honeycombed  with  the  new  heresy  —  to  copy  there 
the  ecclesiastical  policy  of  his  Lancastrian  gaolers.  He  made 
friends  of  the  clergy  by  procuring  straightway  the  enactment  of 
a  statute  similar  to  the  English  one,  under  which  Paul  Craw,  a 
Hussite  emissary,  was  burnt  at  St.  Andrews  in  the  year  1432. 

At  Oxford,  in  1427,  Bishop  Flemyng  of  Lincoln  founded  the 
college  named  after  his  see  for  the  express  purpose  of  training 
young  churchmen  to  combat  Wyclifite  error.  This  shows  how 
widespread  and  deep-rooted  the  new  doctrines  yet  were,  and 
how  inefficient  the  Inquisitors  had  proved  themselves  in  the 
odious  business  of  suppressing  them.  Even  if  all  these  indica- 
tions of  Lollard  strength  were  lacking,  Bishop  Pecock's  great 
work,  "  The  Represser  of  Over-much  Blaming  of  the  Clergy," 
composed  about  the  year  1449,  would  stand  as  a  monument  to 
the  persistence  of  the  sect.  But  while  controverting  many  of 
its  tenets  he  manifested  so  tolerant  a  spirit  toward  others,  and 
broached  views  of  his  own  so  novel  and  startling  that  he  soon 
came. to  be  regarded  as  quite  as  great  a  troubler  of  the  peace 
of  the  church  as  the  sectaries  he  opposed  ;  the  archbishop  of 
Canterbury  condemned  his  critical  opinions,  and  he  found 
himself  confronted  by  the  dilemma  of  recantation  or  the  fagot. 
He  grasped  the  former  horn  and  threw  his  books  into  the  fire. 
Copies  of  them  were  also  burnt  at  Oxford,  where  they  had  led 
astray  numbers  of  the  best  students.  Now  the  pope,  Pius  II, 
interposed  in  his  behalf  ;  but  only  elicited  from  King  Henry 
VI  fuller  information  as  to  the  grounds  of  his  deprivation,  and 
in  1459  —  tne  Year  when  the  civil  war  broke  out  afresh  —  poor 
Pecock  was  sent  to  practical  incarceration  in  a  sequestered 
abbey  in  Cambridgeshire.  Of  his  after  fate  nothing  is  known. 


134  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 


VI. 

IT  commonly  happens  that  in  a  vast  cycle  of  the  world's 
history  distinguished  by  definite  characteristics  from  every 
other  there  will  occur  a  single  epoch,  perhaps  a  generation 
only,  in  which  those  characteristics  are  so  conspicuously 
summed  up  that  one  can  put  his  finger  on  the  place  and  say  : 
This  is  the  essence  of  the  whole,  the  focus  of  every  ray.  Such 
a  comprehensive  period  will  naturally  occur  toward  the  close 
of  a  series  of  ages  that  have  an  inner  harmony,  for  the  series 
will  display  its  peculiar  qualities  more  distinctly  as  it  advances. 
Just  such  a  period,  the  quintessence  of  what  we  call  the  Middle 
Ages,  now  stretches  before  us  for  the  space  of  half  a  century, 
from  about  1460  to  about  1510,  —  including  thus  the  reigns  of 
the  Yorkist  kings  and  the  first  Tudor. 

Every  age  is  of  course  an  age  of  transition,  but  in  the  one 
before  us  it  is  especially  necessary  to  couple  with  this  fact,  that 
at  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century  the  ideas  and  institutions  of 
the  Middle  Ages  came  to  full  fruition,  their  inmost  nature 
standing  revealed,  this  other  fact,  that  there  was  not  one  of 
them  which  the  stream  of  time  was  not  slowly  dissolving  away; 
the  mighty  fabric  of  mediaeval  civilization  was  settling  down 
upon  its  foundations,  to  be  replaced  by  quite  another  structure. 
These  facts,  if  constantly  borne  in  mind,  will  make  many  con- 
trasts clear,  many  puzzling  contradictions  intelligible.  From 
its  very  richness  and  variety  this  complex  era  is  difficult  to 
comprehend,  —  more  so  than  any  we  have  yet  encountered  ; 
but  it  will  repay  any  pains  taken  in  its  study,  for  it  holds  the 
keys  to  the  next  age,  the  marvellous  sixteenth  century ;  it 
determined  the  colossal  movements  of  the  Reformation  era. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  135 

The  spirit  of  feudalism  blazed  forth  with  extraordinary  bril- 
liancy at  the  moment  of  its  expiration  :  never  were  there  more 
commanding  representatives  of  the  feudal  nobility  than  War- 
wick the  king-maker,  Charles  the  Bold,  duke  of  Burgundy,  and 
Ferdinand,  duke  of  Braganza,  —  yet  they  fell  before  the  irre- 
sistible advance  of  new  ideas,  and  their  falls  were  the  death- 
throes  of  a  system.  Sovereigns  and  people  combined,  and 
between  those  upper  and  nether  millstones  the  ancient  aris- 
tocracy was  ground  to  powder  ;  it  was  replaced  by  a  court 
nobility,  —  a  change  indicative  of  a  change  in  culture  equally 
profound. 

Everywhere  at  this  time  strong,  centralized  governments 
were  emerging  from  amid  the  confusion  of  the  passing  age  ; 
governments  that  met  brute  force  with  deep  dissimulation,  that 
overcame  the  anarchic  independence  of  their  vassals  by  playing 
off  one  against  another,  by  sowing  suspicion  among  members 
of  a  hostile  coalition  and  detaching  them  one  by  one  ;  by  tor- 
tuous diplomacy,  by  employment  of  mean  agents,  by  disguising 
stealthy  advances  to  arbitrary  power  under  forms  of  law  ;  by 
ruthless,  exterminating  cruelty  when  occasion  offered  ;  by  stand- 
ing armies  and  the  use  of  ordnance  ;  by  rigid  economy  in 
administration,  and  by  encouragement  of  trade,  —  thereby 
gaining  the  interest  of  an  opulent  class  and  securing  a  revenue. 

The  development  of  a  legal  spirit,  directing  particular  atten- 
tion to  the  details  of  justice,  was  a  prominent  feature  of  the 
time.  And  now,  in  the  decrepitude  of  the  empire,  whose 
"  peace,"  noble  ideal  as  it  was,  was  unhappily  seldom  more 
than  a  dream,  the  statesmen  of  Florence  perfected  a  device 
that  was  to  take  its  place  and  exert  a  tremendous  influence 
upon  the  destinies  of  Europe,  —  the  theory  of  a  "  balance  of 
power,"  enforcing  peace  by  common  resistance  to  the  aggres- 
sions of  an  overweening  foe,  —  an  end  often  attained  only 
through  prodigious  wars. 

Now,   too,    intrepid    Portuguese    navigators    were    bringing 


136  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

home  knowledge  of  new  lands,  and  unfolding  prospects  of  a 
golden  commerce  to  the  dazzled  eyes  of  Europe. 

To  the  papacy  one  more  chance  was  given  to  retrieve  itself, 
to  show  of  what  worth  it  might  be  to  the  nations,  —  and  that 
chance  it  made  haste  to  squander  miserably.  Restored  to  its 
place  by  the  religious  sentiment  of  Christendom,  encircled  with 
a  faint  halo  by  the  lives  and  works  of  a  company  of  saintly 
men  and  women,  reformers  of  discipline,  missionaries,  preach- 
ers, ascetics,  visionaries,  artists,  freed  completely  from  the 
interference  of  emperors,  the  yet  more  fatal  patronage  of 
French  kings,  it  was  left  to  itself  for  a  season  to  work  out  its 
salvation  under  highly  favorable  auspices.  But  hardly  had 
the  salutary  check  of  a  general  council  been  removed  when  it 
began  to  manifest  its  deep-seated  corruption  and  to  speed  upon 
its  downward  career  ;  it  became  the  appanage  of  a  few  power- 
ful families  who  used  it  for  their  own  aggrandizement ;  the 
supreme  pontiffs  themselves  were  luxurious,  some  of  them 
revoltingly  immoral  men,  whose  highest  ambition  was  to  extend 
their  secular  sway  ;  and  the  Christian  world  was  drained  of  gold 
by  disgraceful  means,  the  German  nation  being  bled  above  all 
others,  to  support  their  pleasures,  their  sumptuous  courts,  and 
their  projects  for  disturbing  the  peace  of  Italy. 

Scholastic  philosophy  now  produced  its  last  eminent  doctor, 
Gabriel  Biel,  lecturer  in  theology  at  the  new  University  of 
Tubingen.  He  reproduced  Occam's  doctrine  of  a  Deity  in- 
comprehensible by  man,  whose  attributes  were  mere  accommo- 
dations to  the  imbecility  of  the  human  intellect  and  could  not 
be  proved  to  have  any  ground  in  his  real  nature.  He  made 
explicit  avowal  of  the  doctrine  that  lay  at  the  root  of  the 
religious  legalism  of  the  Middle  Ages  when  he  defined  a  meri- 
torious act  as  consisting  of  two  elements,  the  free-will  of  the 
doer,  and  divine  grace.  His  fresh  assertion  of  the  efficacy  of 
sacraments  without  regard  to  the  character  of  the  recipient  is 
significant,  as  is  his  daring  exaltation  (connected  therewith)  of 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  137 

the  power  of  the  priesthood.     He  was  an  enthusiastic  propa- 
gator of  the  doctrine  of  the  immaculate  conception. 

At  the  same  time  the  "  new  learning,"  coming  in  in  a  flood, 
was  rapidly  undermining  and  sweeping  away  the  relics  of 
the  scholastic  system.  Monasticism,  another  overshadowing 
institution  of  the  Middle  Ages,  was  likewise  disintegrating. 
Though  outwardly  it  seemed  stable,  inwardly  it  was  unsound  ; 
the  reforming,  disciplinary  movement  of  the  last  age  soon 
spent  its  force,  and  its  results,  partial  at  best,  passed  away  like 
a  vapor,  and  left  the  vast  institution  to  disclose  its  inherently 
evil  tendencies ;  it  became  hideously  corrupt.  The  principal 
agents  in  its  dissolution  were  a  reviving,  eager  appetite  for 
enjoyment  of  life,  and  a  strengthening  domestic  sentiment. 

The  astrological  and  alchemical  notions  of  ages  germinated 
afresh  in  this  fecund  period,  close  upon  the  dawn  of  modern 
science  (Copernicus  was  born  in  the  year  1473).  Astrologers 
were  indispensable  functionaries  at  princes'  courts ;  astrologi- 
cal figures  were  painted  upon  walls  and  ceilings  and  embroi- 
dered upon  garments  ;  almanacs  were  compiled  and  were  in 
great  request ;  the  calculation  of  nativities  was  pursued  with 
ardor  and  without  restraint,  —  an  ecclesiastic  actually  pre- 
sumed to  cast  the  horoscope  of  Christ.  Another  could  assert 
that  his  crucifixion  was  determined  by  the  influence  of  the 
stars,  and  a  Bolognese  physician  could  attribute  his  miracles  to 
the  same  influence,  and  still  evade  the  Inquisition.  So  far  did 
the  thought  of  the  age  decline  from  the  ethical  common-sense 
of  Gower.  Among  seekers  for  the  philosopher's  stone  in  this 
century  the  most  famous  was  the  German,  Basil  Valentine,  — 
more  honorably  distinguished  by  chemical  discoveries  of  real 
value  made  during  his  quest.  Divination  and  magical  prac- 
tices flourished,  some  of  them  as  disgusting  as  they  were 
ridiculous.  The  movements  of  the  lions  in  princes'  menag- 
eries were  studied  with  morbid  curiosity  and  superstition,  and 
auguries  drawn  therefrom.  At  the  bottom  of  all  these  notions 


138  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

and  practices  lay  the  persuasion  that  every  property,  every 
motion  in  the  universe  had  some  occult  significance,  some 
bearing  upon  human  destiny,  some  correspondence  in  the 
frame  of  man. 

The  code  of  prosecutions  for  witchcraft  was  now  developed 
with  scientific  precision  and  minuteness  of  detail.  The  occa- 
sion of  this  was  the  publication  of  a  bull  by  Pope  Innocent 
VIII  in  the  year  1484,  calling  attention  to  the  late  portentous 
increase  in  the  number  of  witches  and  recommending  stringent 
measures  for  its  reduction.  The  year  following,  accordingly, 
forty-one  miserable  beings  were  burnt  at  the  town  of  Como 
alone;  and  in  1489,  the  inquisitor  Sprenger,  having  extracted 
full  confessions  of  the  heinous  practices  of  German  witches, 
classified  them,  and  furnished  elaborate  details  of  the  process 
of  conviction,  in  his  "  Witches'  Hammer." 

Never  in  the  history  of  the  Catholic  church  had  there  been 
so  superb  a  ceremonial,  such  triumphs  of  art,  as  glittered  in 
the  last  forty  years  of  the  fifteenth  century  ;  the  elaborate 
rites,  centering  about  the  sacrifice  of  the  mass,  the  ecclesias- 
tical music  and  ornaments  that  were  so  wearisome,  even  offen- 
sive to  Wyclif  s  soul,  were  zealously  cultivated,  and  restored  to 
more  than  their  pristine  magnificence.  Evidence  of  the  taste 
of  the  time  is  afforded  by  the  extraordinary  demand  that  there 
was  for  Durandus'  great  work,  the  "  Rationale "  of  church 
architecture,  ornament,  and  dedication,  vestments,  the  mass, 
and  other  divine  offices,  festivals  and  saints'  days  :  it  was  the 
first  book  put  into  print  after  the  Bible  ;  a  splendid  edition  of 
it  appeared  at  Mainz  in  1459,  and  it  ran  through  twelve  other 
editions  before  the  end  of  the  century.  The  motive  of  all 
this  was  the  elevation  of  the  sacramental  system  above  preach- 
ing,—  extolled  by  Wyclif  and  his  followers  as  of  superior 
efficacy  ;  and  so  at  last  we  are  able  to  discriminate  the  point 
of  departure  of  this  from  the  preceding  age  :  it  consisted  in  a 
renewed  allegiance  and  devotion  to  the  doctrine  of  Transub- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  139 

stantiation,  that  God  is  received  in  the  consecrated  wafer  more 
effectually  than  through  reading  or  hearing  the  Scriptures, 
preaching,  or  any  other  means  whatsoever.  This  was  the  cen- 
tral point  of  the  age  ;  round  it  circled  the  splendid  worship 
and  art,  the  hieratic  absolutism,  the  thought  of  sin  and  justifi- 
cation, all  the  religious  life  of  Christendom.  Indissolubly 
associated  with  it  were  the  benefits  of  confession,  penance, 
and  priestly  absolution  —  pre-requisites  to  reception  —  upon 
which  fresh  emphasis  was  laid.  Pilgrimages  were  resorted  to 
as  highly  meritorious  acts  and  means  of  grace,  —  pleasant  like- 
wise, and  grateful  to  a  mundane  curiosity ;  indulgences  were 
purchased  as  easy  ways  of  escape  from  the  consequences  of 
sin.  It  is  worthy  of  note  that  the  jubilee  cycle  was  now 
reduced  to  one  of  twenty-five  years,  —  so  agreeable  to  one 
party  was  that  means  of  expiation,  so  lucrative  to  the  other. 
Paul  II  published  a  jubilee  for  the  year  1475  — tne  profits  of 
which,  however,  he  did  not  live  to  reap,  —  and  in  order  to 
bring  its  benefits  within  reach  of  all  he  made  a  remarkable 
innovation  in  its  observance,  commuting  the  customary  pil- 
grimage to  Rome  into  a  visit  to  some  local  shrine,  and  a  gift 
according  to  ability.  His  successor,  Sixtus  IV,  reaped  the 
harvest  that  Paul  had  sown  ;  and  in  1477  asserted  the  lawful- 
ness and  efricacy  of  indulgences  in  ransoming  from  purgatory 
the  spirits  of  the  dead. 

One  can  hardly  doubt  that  there  was  a  subtle  yet  real  con- 
nection between  the  dogma  of  transubstantiation  and  the 
alchemist's  notion  of  a  transmutation  of  metals;  that  each 
stood  as  an  argument  for  the  other.  Both  were  rooted  in  the 
confirmed  habit  of  thought  of  five  hundred  years. 

It  is  clear  that  the  idea  of  the  institution,  the  community, 
corporate  interest  was  in  the  ascendant,  as  opposed  to  the  rude 
individualism  of  the  former  age.  The  church  was  rehabilitated 
in  her  authority,  —  its  impersonation,  papal  infallibility,  did  not 
lack  learned  defenders.  Divergences  of  opinion  in  matters  of 


140  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

religion  were  suppressed;  in  1478  the  Spanish  Inquisition  was 
organized  anew,  and  shortly  after  Torquemada  «began  his 
blood-stained  career.  So  it  came  to  pass  that  the  experience 
of  more  than  a  century  before  was  repeated,  in  an  intensified 
form  :  the  intellect  and  the  emotions,  denied  fair  play  in  the 
religious  sphere,  expatiated  in  the  fascinating  fields  of  literature 
and  art.  It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  Roman  literature  was 
totally  neglected  during  the  monastic  ages  ;  most  of  its  greatest 
authors,  Terence,  Cicero  and  Sallust,  Virgil,  Tibullus,  Horace, 
Livy,  and  Ovid,  Seneca  and  Lucan,  Juvenal,  Statius,  and 
Suetonius,  were  known,  at  least  in  part,  and  probably  never 
ceased  to  be  read  somewhere ;  but  in  the  fourteenth  and 
fifteenth  centuries,  through  the  contagion  of  Petrarch's  enthu- 
siasm, the  indefatigable  zeal  of  Poggio  Bracciolini,  the  list 
was  greatly  extended  ;  Plautus,  Lucretius,  much  of  Cicero, 
Catullus,  Vitruvius,  and  Columella,  Quintillian,  Silius  Italicus, 
and  Aulus  Gellius  were  recovered,  and  early  in  the  sixteenth 
century  much  of  Tacitus  was  found  in  a  German  monastery  ; 
and  all  were  studied  with  an  ardor  and  a  veneration  that  it  is 
hard  for  us  to  conceive  to-day.  Even  more  notable,  and  dis- 
tinctive of  the  fifteenth  century,  was  the  revival  of  Greek 
letters.  There  was  already  a  strong  desire  to  become 
acquainted  with  them,  when  the  precarious  condition  of  the 
Eastern  Empire  and  the  projects  for  a  union  between  the 
Greek  and  Latin  churches  sent  westward  a  succession  of  Greek 
scholars  who,  finding  a  warm  welcome  in  Italy,  settled  there 
and  gave  lessons  in  their  language  and  literature.  The  first  of 
these,  the  learned  Chrysoloras,  commissioned  by  the  emperor 
of  Constantinople  to  solicit  aid  against  the  Turks,  finally  estab- 
lished himself  at  Florence,  where  he  became  Poggio's  tutor. 
He  was  employed  by  the  Roman  pope,  Gregory  XII,  to  nego- 
tiate a  union  between  the  churches.  In  1423,  Giovanni 
Aurispa,  a  famous  collector  of  manuscripts,  brought  to  Venice 
from  Constantinople  more  than  two  hundred  codices,  including 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  141 

the  poems  of  Pindar,  and  the  complete  works  of  Plato,  Xeno- 
phon,  Lucian,  Plotinus,  and  Proclus.  Niccolo  Niccoli,  a 
Florentine,  who  died  in  1436,  bequeathed  to  the  republic  his 
precious  collection  of  eight  hundred  Greek,  Latin,  and  Oriental 
manuscripts.  Cosmo  de'  Medici  was  a  princely  purchaser  of 
Greek,  Latin,  Hebrew  and  other  Semitic  manuscripts,  and  thus 
formed  the  nucleus  of  what  was  later  known  as  the  Laurentian 
library.  Parentucelli,  a  noted  humanist  and  patron  of  human- 
ists, who  had  been  engaged  to  draw  up  a  catalogue  of  Niccoli's 
collection,  after  his  accession  to  the  papal  throne  as  Nicholas 
V  gathered  the  extraordinary  number  of  over  five  thousand 
volumes  of  classical  authors,  thus  founding  the  famous  library 
of  the  Vatican.  And  now  at  this  most  favorable  juncture 
came  the  invention  of  printing,  by  which  the  study  of  these 
and  other  authors  was  marvellously  facilitated  ;  the  triumphs 
of  this  art  bring  into  especial  prominence  the  encyclopaedic 
character  of  the  age.  A  remarkable  collection  of  the  earliest 
specimens  of  the  art  exists  in  the  library  that  was  founded  at 
Vienna  about  the  year  1440  by  the  Emperor  Frederick  III. 
The  correction  of  texts  of  the  Latin  classics,  begun  by  Niccoli, 
was  carried  on  with  enthusiasm  and  success  by  the  poet  Angelo 
Poliziano,  who  amended  the  texts  of  Ovid,  Statius,  Quintillian, 
Pliny  Junior,  and  Suetonius,  and  inspired  others  to  do  as  much 
for  those  of  Persius,  Martial,  and  Columella.  The  concourse 
of  scholars  and  ecclesiastics  that  accompanied  the  Greek  em- 
peror to  Florence  in  1439,  t°  effect  a  reconciliation  of  the 
Eastern  and  Western  churches,  marks  another  stage  in  the 
naturalization  of  Greek  culture  in  Italy.  Conspicuous  among 
them  was  the  cultivated  Bessarion,  who,  with  his  tutor  Pletho, 
indoctrinated  the  Italian  mind  in  the  ideal  Platonic  philosophy, 
and,  despite  the  jealous  opposition  of  conservative  thinkers, 
broke  the  spell  of  the  mediaeval  version  of  Aristotle.  The 
domestication  of  Greek  learning  may  be  said  to  have  been 
completed  by  the  fall  of  Constantinople,  which  drove  a  host  of 


142  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

literary  men  to  Italy,  in  the  year  1453  —  the  cardinal  date  of 
the  whole  century,  doubly  important  in  its  bearing  upon  com- 
merce and  discovery  as  well  as  learning  :  the  imperative  neces- 
sity henceforth  of  rinding  a  sea-route  to  India  led  to  the  dis- 
coveries of  Columbus,  the  circumnavigation  of  Africa  by  Vasco 
da  Gama. 

By  the  year  1453  the  Second  Renascence  was  fully  initiated. 
The  differences  between  this  and  the  Petrarchian  period  were 
such  that  it  is  unscientific  in  the  extreme  to  confound  the  two, 
to  assume  that  attributes  of  one  pertain  to  the  other  also.  One 
deeply  significant  characteristic  was  common  to  both  :  a 
divorce  of  morals  and  intellectual  interests  from  religion,  —  a 
condition  of  unstable  spiritual  equilibrium  always  provocative 
of  satire  ;  but  in  the  fifteenth  century  the  schism  was  completer 
than  in  the  fourteenth.  One  patent  distinction  the  later  revival 
enjoyed,  —  an  infusion  of  Hellenic  thought  through  the  pres- 
ence and  tuition  in  the  Greek  language,  literature,  history, 
philosophy,  and  mythology,  of  a  swarm  of  Greek  ambassadors, 
ecclesiastics,  and  literary  refugees  of  more  or  less  repute  who 
wandered  up  and  down  in  Italy.  Again  :  the  first  renascence 
followed  a  prolonged  endeavor  to  bring  political  order  out  of 
chaos  that  had  proved  conspicuously  successful  in  several 
quarters,  fairly  so  in  others ;  whereas  the  second  accompanied 
a  similar  endeavor,  and  emerged  amid  a  welter  of  conflicting 
forces,  keeping  pace  with  the  reestablishment  of  civil  and 
ecclesiastical  authority.  These  and  other  characteristics,  such 
as  the  stronger  family  feeling  before  mentioned,  melt  in  a  clare- 
obscure  of  sentiment  more  easily  felt  than  defined,  differing  as 
much  from  that  of  former  periods  as  Lorenzo  de'  Medici's 
nameless  mistress  differed  from  the  Beatrice  of  Dante,  Pe- 
trarch's Laura,  or  the  Fiammetta  of  Boccaccio.  The  contrast 
was  as  vividly  reflected  in  the  arts,  in  which  a  revolution 
was  wrought  during  the  fifteenth  century  by  the  study  and 
representation  of  the  nude  figure,  the  application  of  the 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  143 

sciences  of  anatomy  and  perspective,  and  the  use  of  colors 
mixed  with  oil. 

A  notable  feature  of  the  later  revival  of  learning  was  the 
greater  participation  in  it  of  the  northern  nations,  shown  in  the 
founding  of  new  homes  of  humanism,  the  Universities  of 
Freiburg  and  Greifswald,  in  the  years  1455  and  1456  respec- 
tively, of  Basel,  in  1459,  Ingolstadt,  1472,  Tubingen  and 
Upsala,  1477,  Copenhagen,  1479,  an^  Wittenberg,  1502.  In 
Scotland,  the  University  of  Glasgow  was  founded  in  1451  ; 
that  of  St.  Andrews  was  enlarged  by  the  founding  of  St. 
Saviour's  College  in  1459  ;  and  King's  College,  the  germ  of 
the  University  of  Aberdeen,  was  instituted  in  1494. 

As  Italy  still  led  the  rest  of  Europe,  so  did  Florence  lead 
Italy  in  intellect,  varied  and  harmonious  culture,  and  the  art  of 
elegant  living.  The  peculiar  position  of  that  republic  —  then 
yielding  itself  to  the  genial  tyranny  of  the  Medici  —  between 
the  duchy  of  Milan  and  the  oligarchic  republic  of  Venice  on 
the  one  hand,  and  the  papal  monarchy  and  the  kingdom  of 
Naples  on  the  other,  explains  how  it  was  that  there,  in  the 
midst  of  such  mixed  political  relations,  that  compelled  perpetual 
vigilance  for  the  preservation  of  autonomy,  there  should  have 
been  devised  that  delicate  adjustment  of  forces  known  as  a 
balance  of  power.  The  conquest  of  Pisa  in  the  year  1406  was 
probably  the  most  important  event  in  Florentine  history  ;  it 
resulted  in  the  purchase  of  Livorno  in  1421  ;  and  Florence, 
now  first  possessed  of  a  strip  of  sea-coast,  began  a  new  role  as 
a  maritime  power,  —  her  galleys  appeared  in  the  Levant,  the 
Black  Sea,  and  the  English  channel.  This  enlargement  of 
horizon  was  a  powerful  stimulus  to  her  intellectual  life  :  the 
sciences  of  astronomy  and  navigation  had  henceforth  a  practical 
interest  for  many  of  her  citizens  which  occasioned  the  flourish 
of  mathematical  studies  that  soon  ensued  and  that  exerted  a 
profound  influence  upon  the  arts.  Political  consequences  of 
magnitude  followed  this  extension  of  commerce  ;  large  part  of 


144  OUTLINE   OF  THE  PHILOSOPHY 

the  wealth  that  flowed  from  it  fell  to  the  merchant  princes 
of  the  house  of  Medici  and  enhanced  their  power:  the  recall 
of  the  great  Cosmo  from  brief  exile  in  the  year  1434  was 
not  obscurely  connected  with  the  conquest  of  Pisa.  He 
remained  the  first  citizen  of  the  republic  until  his  death  in  1464, 
—  a  position  which  his  grandson,  Lorenzo  the  Magnificent, 
exchanged  for  almost  absolute  sway. 

The  wealth  of  Florence  exhaled  in  a  refined  civilization  such 
as  the  world  had  not  seen  since  the  golden  age  of  Athenian 
culture  nearly  two  thousand  years  before  ;  and  there  was  about 
it  a  subtlety,  spirituality,  inventiveness,  a  certain  iridescent 
play  of  color  that  contrasts  picturesquely  with  the  statuesque 
repose  and  beauty  relatively  perfect  within  narrower  limits  of 
the  classic  time.  It  cannot  be  too  emphatically  stated  that  the 
humanists  as  a  class  had  no  earnest  quarrel  with  the  Catholic 
church,  —  rather  they  confessed  her  authority.  They  despised 
the  quiddities  of  scholasticism,  the  barbarous  Latin  of  which 
moreover  smote  harshly  upon  ears  sensitive  to  Ciceronian 
cadences  ;  they  had  a  hearty  antipathy  to  monks  and  friars,  — 
but  none  to  a  cultivated  hierarchy,  a  papacy  adorned  by  such 
noted  humanists  as  Nicholas  V  and  Pius  II.  The  imposing 
ceremonial  of  the  church  gratified  their  aesthetic  sense  ;  the 
common  notion  of  propitiation,  quite  like  that  of  the  ancients, 
was  no  offence  to  them  ;  nor  was  the  dogma  of  transubstantia- 
tion  monstrous  to  men  who  revelled  in  the  classic  lore  of  meta- 
morphosis. But  while  they  acknowledged  a  mysterious  depend- 
ence upon  the  sacraments,  and  yielded  to  the  church  all 
responsibility  for  their  spiritual  life,  they  indemnified  them- 
selves by  boundless  liberty  in  the  region  of  the  human.  An 
ideal  of  culture,  of  a  perfected  personality,  of  an  harmonious 
play  of  every  activity  of  mind  and  body,  took  possession  of 
the  youth  of  Florence.  The  charm  of  the  old  ideal  of  knight- 
hood was  still  potent  ;  it  lingered  on  as  the  basis  of  the  new 
manhood  and  was  enriched  by  the  novel  thought  of  manifold 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  145 

accomplishment ;  the  result  was  a  fusion  of  mediaeval  and 
classic  ideals.  The  complete  man  must  be  expert  in  horse- 
manship and  all  the  exercises  of  a  cavalier  ;  he  must  be  a 
good  swimmer,  runner  and  wrestler  (a  touch  of  the  palaestra 
here)  ;  he  must  also  learn  to  dance.  Beside  his  native  Tuscan 
a  cultivated  man  should  master  at  least  one  other  language, 
—  and  that  should  be  the  language  of  Cicero.  He  should  be 
versed  in  literature  and  be  a  connoisseur  of  art ;  he  should 
sing  or  perform  upon  some  instrument  of  music,  —  lute,  harp, 
organ,  or  (best  of  all)  the  violin.  A  conception  like  this  seen 
embodied  in  one  individual  enthralls  the  imagination  of  an  age; 
it  was  more  than  realized  in  the  consummate  character  of  Leo 
Battista  Alberti,  —  and  all  who  knew  him  confessed  the  fasci- 
nation of  his  personality.  He  was  athletic,  literary,  musical ;  a 
wit,  and  a  polished  Latinist  in  verse  and  prose.  He  wrote  an 
Italian  treatise,  "  La  Famiglia,"  in  which  he  held  up  a  noble 
ideal  of  domestic  life.  He  was  a  mathematician,  a  student  of 
science  and  law.  He  drew  and  wrote  on  art.  He  was  a 
passionate  admirer  of  natural  beauty  and  was  often  melted  to 
tears  by  the  sight  of  a  fair  landscape.  His  contemporary, 
Pope  Pius  II,  gave  expression  to  a  feeling  similar  but  not  so 
romantic,  more  in  the  vein  of  Virgil  and  Statius,  in  his  Latin 
"  Commentaries  "  ;  in  the  description  of  his  summer  haunt  at 
Tivoli,  where,  among  the  ivy-clad  ruins  of  Hadrian's  villa,  he 
mused  upon  the  transiency  of  earthly  glory,  we  have  that 
mingled  sense  of  the  beauty  of  nature  and  the  pathos  of  the 
dead  past  that  was  a  dominant  note  of  Renascent  life.  This 
graceful  melancholy  was  nourished  by  pictures  of  ruins  embow- 
ered in  dark  laurel  and  funereal  cypress,  the  first  of  which 
appeared  in  the  year  1467. 

Sex  was  not  recognized  in  the  culture  of  the  intellect ; 
sisters  enjoyed  the  same  advantages  of  education  as  their 
brothers  ;  and  numbers  of  highly  accomplished  women  gave 
tone  to  the  social  life  of  the  day.  They  were  conversant  with 


146  OUTLINE    OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

classic  literature,  both  Latin  and  Greek,  and  often  wrote  strong 
verse  of  their  own  ;  they  could  engage  in  philosophic  discus- 
sion and  correspond  with  celebrated  scholars  upon  equal 
terms  ;  they  were  skilled  in  vocal  and  instrumental  music. 
Graceful  and  dignified  demeanor,  facile  dialogue,  exquisite 
purity  of  speech,  were  cultivated  as  fine  arts. 

A  day  spent  in  this  wise  was  accounted  perfect :  first,  in  the 
freshness  of  the  morning,  a  ramble  among  the  hills,  the  conver- 
sation meanwhile  threading  some  Platonic  dream  ;  about  the 
middle  of  the  forenoon,  breakfast,  accompanied  by  song  and 
music  ;  then  to  a  shady  garden  nook,  to  listen  to  the  recital  of 
an  original  poem  by  one  of  the  company  ;  after  a  long  siesta 
through  the  languid  hours,  to  meet  again  in  the  cool  of  the 
evening  by  a  bubbling  spring  or  fountain,  every  one  to  tell 
some  tale  "of  effect  of  joy"  or  sorrow;  then  supper,  followed 
by  sprightly  talk  which  should  yet  keep  within  the  bounds  of 
delicacy. 

This  delightful  programme  might  have  been  deduced  from 
joyous  days  actually  passed  by  Lorenzo  and  his  friends  at  his 
palatial  villa  of  Ambra,  with  its  woods  stocked  with  Sicilian 
pheasants  and  peacocks,  its  gardens  and  orchards  along  the 
river-side,  —  or  at  his  other  villa  at  hilly  Fiesole,  where  he 
especially  enjoyed  the  society  of  the  philosophers,  scholars  and 
poets  who  were  his  intimate  companions.  There  might  be 
seen  the  noble  Ficino,  to  whom  the  Platonic  philosophy  had 
become  a  religion,  and  who  exemplified  in  his  daily  walk  its 
refining  tendency;  Poliziano,  his  pupil,  an  eminent  scholar, 
exquisite  Latinist,  and  the  first  Italian  poet  since  Petrarch; 
Pulci,  wit  and  poet,  author  of  a  voluminous  mock-epic,  the 
"  Morgante  Maggiore";  and  thither  came  a  singular  product  of 
the  Renascence,  the  omniscient  young  Pico,  prince  of  Mirandola, 
who  had  lately  published  at  Rome  innumerable  theses,  drawn 
from  all  the  great  departments  of  knowledge,  which  he  was 
prepared  to  defend  in  half  a  dozen  different  languages.  Poli- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  147 

ziano's  "  Stanzas,"  written  when  he  was  a  mere  boy  on  occa- 
sion of  a  grand  tournament  held  by  Giuliano  de'  Medici,  evince 
a  delicate,  Virgilian  appreciation  of  rural  beauty  and  contain 
a  whole  gallery  of  mythological  pictures.  His  description  of 
the  never-fading,  Elysian  loveliness  of  Venus'  haunt  on  the 
island  of  Cyprus  was  a  first  sketch  for  yet  more  glowing 
descriptions  of  delicious  gardens  by  greater  poets  of  a  later 
day.  He  also  wrote  in  Italian  a  tiny  lyrical  drama,  "  Orpheus," 
and  a  few  minor  poems.  The  true  nature  of  Pulci's  work  has 
often  been  a  subject  of  debate ;  it  has  been  argued  that  it  is 
wholly  satirical  and  skeptical  of  established  beliefs  and  institu- 
tions. The  fact  seems  to  be  that  it  is  a  jocoserious  production, 
a  merry  parody  of  the  romances  of  chivalry  still  in  vogue,  heap- 
ing deserved  ridicule  by  the  way  on  the  religious  orders,  yet 
flowering  out  now  and  then  in  passages  of  genuine  emotion. 

A  sign  of  the  satirical  spirit  that  grew  with  the  growth  of 
political  absolutism  is  afforded  by  the  court  fools  whose  num- 
bers were  now  multiplied  in  the  retinues  of  the  petty  despots 
of  Italy  and  thence  throughout  Europe.  Those  fantastic 
beings  were  privileged  to  mock  and  gibe  without  respect  of 
persons,  and  sometimes,  in  the  guise  of  jest,  to  let  their  impe- 
rious masters  know  what  otherwise  they  would  never  hear,  — 
just  what  others  thought  of  them. 

The  peculiar  glory  of  Florence  in  the  fifteenth  century  was 
her  art.  In  architecture  a  remarkable  innovation  distinguished 
the  second  Renascence,  —  the  introduction  of  the  dome.  In 
the  year  1420  Brunelleschi  began  and  left  almost  finished  at 
his  death  in  1444  his  magnificent  dome  over  the  cathedral. 
Years  before  he  had  visited  Rome  with  his  boy  friend  Donatello 
—  destined  to  prove  himself  in  time  one  of  the  greatest  sculptors 
of  the  world  —  and  had  been  deeply  impressed  by  the  superb 
cupola  of  the  Pantheon.  He  returned  to  Florence  filled  with 
enthusiasm  for  the  wonderful  works  of  antiquity  and  with  an 
ambition  to  recover  the  mechanical  knowledge  of  the  old 


148  .OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

Romans  and  to  rival  their  constructive  feats.  Donatello 
returned  to  carve  many  noble  statues,  among  them  his  ideally 
beautiful  St.  George  ;  after  a  second  sojourn  in  the  papal 
capital  he  executed  in  1433  his  reliefs  of  dancing  children  for 
the  choir  gallery  of  the  Florentine  cathedral.  The  organ 
gallery  was  decorated  with  like  reliefs  by  Luca  della  Robbia ; 
his  marble  youths  and  maidens  are  vocal  with  the  spirit  of  song  ; 
his  children,  singing,  playing,  and  dancing,  his  little  naked 
frolicsome  boys,  express  the  very  ecstacy  of  renascent  life,  and 
reveal  the  artist's  admiring  love  of  happy  childhood.  Nothing 
could  picture  more  vividly  the  strength  of  the  healthy  reaction 
from  monastic  ideas. 

In  1451  Donatello  designed  an  equestrian  statue  —  the  first 
since  the  decline  of  art  in  ancient  Rome.  The  year  following 
his  illustrious  compeer,  Lorenzo  Ghiberti,  finished  his  second 
glorious  set  of  sculptured  bronze  doors  for  the  Florentine 
baptistery. 

This  revival  of  the  sculptor's  art  was  due  to  the  passion  for 
antique  and  natural  beauty  already  noticed.  The  rage  for 
collecting  statues,  busts,  fragments  of  sculpture,  vases,  coins, 
engraved  gems,  was  identical  in  principle  with  the  lust  of  pos- 
sessing manuscripts  of  classical  authors.  The  discovery  dur- 
ing the  pontificates  of  Alexander  VI  and  Julius  II  of  the  Apollo 
Belvedere,  the  group  of  the  Laocoon,  the  Torso  and  Venus 
named  of  the  Vatican,  resembled  in  effect  the  recovery  of  a 
lost  work  by  Cicero  or  Tacitus.  In  the  early  part  of  the  cen- 
tury Cyriac  of  Ancona,  a  zealous  antiquary,  explored  the  coasts 
of  the  Mediterranean,  exhuming  bits  of  sculpture,  sketching 
what  was  too  large  for  him  to  carry  away ;  when  asked  why  he 
spent  his  time  and  substance  in  such  pursuits  he  replied,  "  To 
wake  the  dead  ! "  Cosmo  de'  Medici  left  to  his  son  a  large 
collection  of  gold  and  silver  medals,  cameos  and  gold  rings 
with  stones  engraved  with  classic  and  mythological  subjects, 
inlaid  tables  from  Byzantium,  and  similar  treasures.  Such 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  149 

were  the  beautiful  objects  desire  of  which  banished,  from 
Florence  at  least,  the  old-time  eagerness  for  nauseous  relics  of 
saints.  The  splendid  Lorenzo  inherited  to  the  full  his  grand- 
father's tastes  ;  the  readiest  way  to  his  favor  was  to  present 
him  an  ancient  vase  or  coin.  Along  the  garden  walks  and 
arcades  behind  his  palace  in  the  city  he  caused  his  statuary, 
busts,  and  other  specimens  of  ancient  sculpture  to  be  arranged, 
and  instituted  there  an  academy  of  art  under  the  direction  of 
Bertoldo,  a  chosen  pupil  of  Donatello.  There  that  master's 
methods  were  transmitted  to  the  succeeding  generation ;  there 
Torrigiano  studied  and  the  young  Angelo  learned  his  art. 

We  have  already  observed  an  improvement  in  the  technics 
of  painting.  By  the  middle  of  the  century  the  new  medium  — 
oil, —  first  successfully  employed  by  the  Flemish  painters, 
Hubert  and  Jan  Van  Eyck,  — found  its  way  into  the  studios  of 
Venice  and  Florence.  Somewhat  earlier,  Masaccio,  an  artist 
of  extraordinary  genius,  who  died  very  young,  originated  the 
naturalistic  style  of  painting  by  his  noble  frescoes  (which  he 
did  not  live  to  finish)  in  the  Brancacci  chapel  of  the  Carmelite 
church  in  Florence.  In  one  of  these  a  youth  who  kneels  to  an 
apostle  who  has  wrought  his  miraculous  recovery  is  represented 
entirely  naked,  —  the  first  figure  of  the  kind  in  modern  art. 

The  Brancacci  chapel  became  a  school  for  future  artists  ; 
Filippo  Lippi  studied  there,  and  his  son  Filippino  finished 
Masaccio's  frescoes. 

The  next  nude  figure  of  note  was  that  by  Botticelli  of  Venus 
floating  over  the  sea  in  her  shell.  But  all  previous  efforts  in 
this  line  were  puny  and  immature  as  compared  with  Signorelli's  ; 
in  his  frescoes  at  Orvieto,  executed  upon  the  threshold  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  that  great  master  revealed  a  consummate 
knowledge  of  anatomy  and  a  Dantesque  imaginative  power 
that  mark  him  as  the  forerunner  of  Michael  Angelo. 

A  pioneer  in  the  application  of  mathematical  science  to  the 
arts  of  design  was  Paolo  Uccelli,  a  pupil  of  Ghiberti.  He  prose- 


150  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

cuted  with  enthusiasm  the  study  of  perspective  and  made  its 
principles  generally  known.  A  younger  contemporary  of  his, 
Antonio  Pollajuolo,  was  an  expert  both  in  perspective  and 
anatomy. 

When  we  turn  to  the  inventive  side  of  the  art  we  are  struck 
by  its  widening  range  of  subjects  and  its  increased  capacity  to 
express  emotion,  from  the  tenderest  human  feeling  to  the  terrific 
and  sublime.  The  irresistible  inclination  of  the  age  made  it 
inevitable  that  art  should  at  last  overstep  its  scriptural  and 
ecclesiastical  limits  and  enter  the  field  of  classical  and  mytho- 
logical illustration.  Botticelli  led  the  way ;  his  "  Birth  of 
Venus  "  has  just  been  mentioned  ;  another  interesting  work  of 
his  among  many  in  this  style  is  his  attempted  reproduction  of 
the  "  Calumny  "  of  Apelles,  from  a  passage  descriptive  of  the 
original  in  an  ancient  author.  The  magnificent  series  of 
pictures  by  the  great  Paduan  master,  Andrea  Mantegna,  illus- 
trating "  The  Triumph  of  Julius  Caesar,"  is  well-known.  Pin- 
turicchio's  "  Sibyls "  at  Rome  remind  us  of  Angelo's,  and 
those  of  the  "Three  Fates,"  and  those  of  Da  Vinci's  terrible 
Medusa. 

Pinturicchio's  name  recalls  his  masterpieces  at  Siena  (in 
executing  which  he  enjoyed  the  collaboration  of  the  young 
Raphael)  —  frescoes  illustrating  the  leading  events  in  the  life 
of  yEneas  Sylvius  (Pope  Pius  II)  —  representative  of  the  new 
departments  of  historical  and  portrait  painting  that  flourished 
with  the  reviving  idea  of  earthly  renown.  Families  and  com- 
munities were  desirous  of  preserving  likenesses  of  their  illus- 
trious members.  Another  important  feature  of  renascent  life 
we  may  connect  with  his  name :  delight  in  beauty  of  land- 
scape, charmingly  shown  in  the  backgrounds  of  some  of  these 
pictures. 

The  deepest  inspiration,  the  motive  power  of  this  great  epoch 
of  art  was,  however,  a  renewed  devotion  to  the  Virgin  Mary. 
A  causal  connection  subsists  between  the  feminine  ideal  and 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  151 

all  high  art ;  the  perception  of  the  divine  in  womanhood,  in 
motherhood,  exerts  a  refining  influence,  bestows  a  new  sense 
of  beauty.  Without  the  Athena  of  Phidias,  the  Hera  of  Poly- 
cletus,  the  Mary  of  Giotto  and  Raphael,  those  artists  and  the 
epochs  they  dominated  would  have  been  other  and  far  less  than 
they  were.  In  the  fifteenth  century  pope  and  council  were  at 
one  in  forwarding  the  cultus  of  Mary  :  the  council  of  Basel 
promulgated  anew  the  doctrine  of  her  immaculate  conception, 
and  Sixtus  IV  forbade  dispute  about  it  and  authorized  its  cele- 
bration. This  action  was  symptomatic  of  a  fresh  wave  of 
popular  devotion,  generated  in  part  by  way  of  reaction  against 
Wyclifite  and  Hussite  disparagement  of  the  cultus.  Even  the 
laughing  Pulci  grows  serious  and  devout  when  he  invokes 
Mary,  as  he  does  in  opening  several  cantos  of  his  work ;  at  its 
very  beginning  he  adores  her  as  daughter,  mother,  and  spouse 
of  God  (that  is,  of  the  persons  of  the  Trinity  respectively)  and 
entreats  her  to  illumine  his  mind,  inspire  his  style,  and  guide 
him  through  the  whole  progress  of  the  work.  Thus  she  became 
to  him  what  the  Muse  was  to  a  Roman  poet. 

The  painters  of  the  age  set  forth  their  ideal  of  womanhood 
in  innumerable  Madonnas.  Representations  of  the  man  Christ 
were  remarkably  rare  :  their  place  was  usurped  by  the  Madonna 
and  infant  Jesus.  The  invasion  of  devotional  art  by  the 
realistic  spirit  is  shown  by  this,  that  whereas  previously  the 
Virgin  was  represented  veiled  and  the  child  swathed,  toward 
the  close  of  the  century  she  was  pictured  with  uncovered  head 
and  the  child  naked.  Scenes  from  her  life  were  painted  by 
Ghirlandajo  upon  the  choir-wall  of  Santa  Maria  Novella.  A 
memorable  development  of  the  doctrine  of  the  immaculate  con- 
ception was  the  novel  cultus  ftf  Ann,  mother  of  the  Virgin  ;  the 
devout  sentiment  of  the  age  soon  raised  her  to  a  position  close 
by  her  daughter,  as  we  see  her  portrayed  by  the  Bolognese 
master  Francia.  In  such  a  subject  we  can  perceive  beside  the 
working  of  domestic  sentiment,  of  a  sense  of  the  beauty  and 


152  OUTLINE    OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

goodness  of  human  relationships,  which  was  manifested  yet  more 
strongly  and  perfectly  in  those  beautiful  groups,  the  "  Holy 
Families  "  that  first  appeared  at  the  end  of  the  century. 

A  further  awakening  of  emotion,  an  effort  to  compel  feelings 
of  pity,  pain,  and  terror  by  representations  of  the  mortal  suffer- 
ings of  the  Redeemer,  are  widely  apparent  in  the  art  of  the 
time.  The  tragic  series  of  "  Stations  of  the  Cross  "  was  trans- 
planted into  Europe  by  a  pilgrim  from  the  Holy  Land  in  the 
year  1477.  Now  for  the  first  time  we  find  the  Saviour  repre- 
sented as  falling  under  the  weight  of  his  cross.  The  awful 
scene  of  the  crucifixion  was  depicted  with  great  power  by  Man- 
tegna  and  the  Venetian  master  Bellini ;  and  now  at  that 
supreme  moment  the  triumph  of  natural  feeling  over  faith  was 
betrayed  by  the  swooning  of  Mary,  —  in  some  examples  she 
even  falls  as  if  dead.  By  reason  of  its  pathos  the  "  Pieta,"  - 
the  mother  lamenting  over  the  dead  body  of  her  son  —  was  an 
oft-attempted  subject  :  it  was  nobly  and  tenderly  treated  by 
Francia  and  Fra  Bartolomeo.  Perugino's  sentimental  concep- 
tion of  the  ascension  offers  a  significant  contrast  to  the  fervent 
faith  revealed  in  Giotto's  upward  soaring  figure  :  his  Saviour 
seems  to  pause  between  earth  and  heaven,  and  looks  down 
with  a  pensive,  almost  affected  grace  upon  the  friends  he  is 
leaving  below. 

Finally,  we  have  to  notice  an  invention  that  was  to  art  what 
printing  was  to  literature,  a  means  of  multiplying  copies  of 
pictures  as  the  other  multiplied  books,  —  the  art  of  engraving 
on  copper.  To  Baccio  Baldini,  a  Florentine,  who  acted  upon 
the  suggestion  afforded  him  by  impressions  of  goldsmiths'  work, 
the  credit  of  the  invention  seems  to  be  due  ;  he  was  assisted 
with  designs  by  several  of  the  enfinent  artists  lately  mentioned. 

The  substance  of  these  last  few  pages  is  intended  whenever 
henceforth  we  have  occasion  to  allude  to  the  influence  of  Italy 
upon  other  peoples.  It  is  futile  to  talk  about  that  influence 
unless  it  is  clearly  understood  what  is  meant  by  it. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  153 

In  Spain,  during  the  long  and  troubled  reign  of  John  II, 
considerable  progress  was  made  in  domesticating  the  study  of 
classic  and  Italian  literature  by  Juan  de  Mena  and  the  Marquis 
of  Santillana.  The  latter  introduced  the  sonnet  into  Castilian 
literature,  and,  though  not  a  scholar  himself,  was  a  generous 
patron  of  scholars,  and  urged  on  translation  of  the  Latin 
classics  ;  the  former  was  a  devoted  student  of  the  Italian  poets, 
and  in  his  famous  *  Labyrinth  '  modelled  himself  upon  Dante. 
The  conquest  of  Naples  in  the  year  1443  by  the  royal  humanist 
Alfonso  V  of  Aragon  was  an  important  factor  in  making  the 
intellectual  movement  in  Italy  better  known  in  the  Peninsula. 
At  that  epoch,  too,  flourished  the  Catalan  poet  Ausias  March, 
whose  delicate  love-poems  composed  some  during  his  lady's 
lifetime,  some  after  her  death,  confessed  the  fascination  of 
Petrarch's  muse. 

The  main  interest  of  Spanish  history  through  the  first  half  of 
the  century  centres  in  the  person  of  one  of  the  most  famous 
of  royal  favorites  —  Alvaro  de  Luna.  His  influence  over  the 
cultivated  but  somewhat  frivolous  king  seemed  like  witchcraft ; 
it  was  offset  by  the  implacable  hatred  of  the  great  nobles.  In 
part,  doubtless,  to  divert  their  attention  from  his  internal 
administration  of  the  government,  the  favorite  engaged  John  II 
in  a  campaign  against  the  Moors  of  Granada  ;  it  was  highly 
successful,  and  the  conquest  of  that  delightful  province  might 
have  been  anticipated  by  many  years  but  for  the  disaffection  of 
the  nobles ;  their  intrigues  against  Alvaro  culminated  at  last 
in  tedious  civil  wars  that  gave  opportunity  for  a  retaliatory 
invasion  by  the  Moors.  Alvaro's  pride  finally  outwore  the 
king's  infatuation  :  his  sudden  fall  from  the  pinnacle  of  power 
and  speedy  execution  in  the  year  1453  added  another  example 
to  the  moralist's  long  catalogue  of  Fortune's  caprices.  A  year 
later  John  II  followed  him  to  the  tomb  and  was  succeeded  by 
his  son,  Henry  IV,  who  in  the  recent  disturbances  had  joined 
the  ranks  of  the  rebel  lords.  In  his  careless,  pleasure-loving 


154  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

temper  Henry  resembled  his  father,  but  was  yet  weaker  ;  he  was 
governed  by  favorites  and  mistresses  and  the  manners  of  his 
palace  were  a  scandal  to  Spain.  In  order  to  humble  the  lords 
—  his  late  associates  —  he  advanced  persons  of  low  origin  to 
positions  of  honor  and  influence,  —  but  the  result  was  a  repeti- 
tion of  the  wretched  broils  of  his  father's  time.  In  1463  Henry 
and  Louis  XI  had  a  conference  at  Fuentarabia ;  the  French 
king  had  offered  his  services  in  settling  matters  in  dispute 
between  Castile  and  Aragon,  —  but  his  decision  pleased  neither 
party.  Shortly  after  civil  war  broke  out  in  Castile  ;  beside  the 
nobility,  many  large  towns  fell  away  from  their  allegiance  ; 
Henry's  conduct  had  disgusted  all  classes,  and  in  his  person 
the  monarchy  was  subjected  to  extreme  humiliation.  His  crown 
was  at  last  offered  to  his  young  sister,  Isabella  ;  she  put  it 
by  for  the  time,  and  Henry,  having  submitted  to  his  enemies' 
hard  conditions,  was  allowed  to  end  his  pitiable  career  upon 
the  throne.  In  1469  took  place  one  of  the  famous  marriages 
of  history  —  a  union  destined  to  bring  order  out  of  this  political 
and  social  chaos  and  to  weld  the  weak  and  warring  states  of 
Spain  into  one  compact  and  powerful  monarchy  —  the  marriage 
of  Isabella  with  Ferdinand  of  Aragon.  From  the  first  their 
union  was  regarded  by  all  who  longed  for  order  as  the  hope  of 
their  distracted  country,  the  pledge  of  good  government  to 
come  —  a  pledge  amply  redeemed  by  Isabella  when  she  acceded 
to  the  throne  upon  her  brother's  death  in  the  year  1474. 

The  strange  character  of  Louis  XI  impressed  itself  deeply 
upon  his  age  and  has  been  revealed  for  all  time  by  his  secre- 
tary and  confidential  adviser,  Philippe  de  Comynes,  whose 
"  Memoirs  "  are  doubtless  the  best-known  and  most  consider- 
able work  of  the  period.  Less  therefore  need  be  said  about 
him  than  his  darkly  commanding  position  would  justify ;  all 
we  need  do  is  to  indicate,  with  a  few  brief  touches,  his  his- 
torical connections.  Like  Henry  IV  Louis  had,  as  heir-appar- 
ent, joined  the  rebels  to  his  father's  authority ;  like  him,  but 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE. 


with  more  success,  he  as  king  made  use  of  mean  agents  in  his 
subtle  stripe  with  the  feudal  aristocracy.  His  confidants  and 
tools,  Olivier  le  Dain  and  Tristan  1'Hermite,  remind  one  too  of 
Catesby  and  Cochran,  the  base  instruments  of  his  young 
contemporaries,  Richard  III  of  England  and  James  III  of 
Scotland.  To  the  extension  and  elevation  of  the  royal  power 
and  the  ruin  of  feudalism  involved  therein  Louis  bent  all  the 
energies  of  an  intellect  fertile  in  resource,  tireless  in  opera- 
tion, and  unscrupulous  as  to  the  means  employed.  In  the 
science  of  politics  the  despots  of  ^taly  were  his  tutors  ;  the  won- 
derfully successful  career  of  an  elder  contemporary,  Francesco 
Sforza,  who  by  a  master-stroke  of  craft  and  cruelty  had  made 
himself  duke  of  Milan,  especially  excited  his  admiration.  He 
mastered  perfectly  the  art  of  managing  others  by  self-interest 
and  fear,  of  dividing  opponents  that  he  might  overcome  them 
separately.  He  played  upon  the  weaknesses  and  passions  of 
his  victims  and  would  flatter  one  to  his  face  while  by  secret, 
far-off  agencies  he  was  preparing  his  destruction.  And  when 
he  had  an  enemy  in  his  toils  nothing  could  exceed  his  malice 
and  cruelty.  The  mingled  guile  and  ruthlessness  of  his  nature 
and  the  singular  success  with  which  his  policy  was  crowned 
exerted  a  sort  of  fascination,  the  fascination  of  terror,  over  the 
minds  of  his  contemporaries.  Some  years  elapsed,  however, 
after  he  came  to  the  throne  in  the  summer  of  1461  before  his 
character  appeared  fully  in  this  light  :  at  first  he  was  more 
openly  aggressive  and  ambitious  ;  the  great  representatives  of 
French  feudalism  took  the  alarm,  banded  themselves  together, 
and  gave  him  check  in  battle  at  Montl'hery,  —  and  with  that 
his  career  of  cunning  began  ;  he  resolved  henceforth  to  avoid 
appeals  to  arms  and  to  meet  violence  with  skilful  negotiation, 
deceit,  and  corruption.  After  the  battle  he  seemed  to  yield 
everything  they  asked  to  the  confederated  lords,  but  it  was  only 
to  find  time  to  practise  upon  them,  break  up  their  league,  and 
isolate  his  great  adversary,  Charles  the  Bold,  who  in  1467 


156  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

became  duke  of  Burgundy  and  for  the  next  ten  years  —  the 
middle  period  of  his  reign  —  gave  Louis'  energies  abundant 
employment.  The  way  in  which  the  king  recovered  the  ground 
he  had  lost,  his  dealings  with  the  French  dukes  and  with  Charles, 
the  personification  of  overgrown  feudalism,  remind  one  of 
nothing  so  much  as  of  Reynard  the  Fox,  and  the  tricks  he 
played  upon  the  bear,  wolf,  cat,  hare,  etc.,  in  that  great  poem 
of  the  thirteenth  century  which  was  now  enjoying  a  renewed 
popularity.  The  redoubtable  league  of  little  Swiss  republics 
proved  at  last  a  serviceable  1*>ol  to  the  most  absolute  monarch 
in  Europe  :  the  city  of  Berne,  instigated  by  Louis,  rushed  into 
a  war  with  Charles,  drew  with  it  the  other  cantons,  and  inflicted 
upon  the  rash  duke  a  series  of  crushing  defeats  that  culminated 
in  his  death  upon  the  field  of  battle  early  in  the  year  1477.  ^ 
was  left  for  Louis,  in  the  seven  remaining  years  of  his  reign, 
triumphantly  to  gather  in  the  fruit  of  his  dextrous  policy.  His 
exultation  at  the  fall  of  his  powerful  rival,  however,  caused  him 
to  forget  the  caution  that  was  necessary  in  prosecuting  one 
of  his  favorite  projects,  the  marriage  of  his  son  to  Charles's 
daughter  Mary,  heiress  of  Burgundy  :  he  allowed  his  rapacious, 
treacherous  disposition  to  appear  so  plainly  in  his  dealings  with 
her  that  the  young  duchess,  disgusted  and  indignant,  threw 
herself  into  the  arms  of  the  imperial  faction,  and  in  August, 
1477,  wedded  Maximilian  of  Austria,  —  and  Louis  had  the 
mortification  of  seeing  the  wealthy  provinces  of  the  Netherlands 
transferred  as  an  hereditary  possession  to  the  House  of  Haps- 
burg.  This  was  the  second  marriage  of  rare  consequence  in 
that  period.  It  was  the  chief  success  attained  by  the  emperor 
Frederick  III  —  Maximilian's  father  —  in  his  reign  of  more 
than  half  a  century  (one  of  the  longest  in  history),  in  the  course 
of  which  he  suffered  every  ignominy. 

Frederick  is  a  conspicuous  example  of  the  way  in  which  the 
princes  of  his  time  rallied  around  the  rehabilitated  papacy  : 
none  of  them  surpassed  him  in  devout  submission  to  it,  —  and 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  157 

he  had  his  reward.  He  surrendered  to  Eugenius  IV  the  privi- 
leges that  the  council  of  Basel  had  secured  to  the  German 
church ;  and  some  years  later,  when  his  incapacity  and  neg- 
lect of  imperial  interests  had  so  disgusted  the  electors  that 
they  began  to  think  seriously  of  deposing  him,  Pius  II  came  to 
his  support  and  held  him  on  the  throne.  He  carried  on  his 
private  studies,  astrological  and  medical,  careless  though  the 
empire  fell  to  pieces  under  the  blows  of  the  invading  Turks. 
In  public  affairs  he  pursued  a  Fabian  policy  of  inactivity,  — 
but  under  a  phlegmatic  exterior  concealed  far-reaching  designs 
for  the  aggrandizement  of  his  house  which  were  realized  at 
the  end  of  his  reign,  after  the  Burgundian  match. 

The  founding  of  German  Universities  has  been  mentioned 
as  evidence  that  the  wave  of  humanism  was  travelling  north- 
ward ;  in  the  year  1467,  Desiderius  Erasmus,  destined  to 
become  the  great  exponent  of  northern  humanism,  was  born  in 
Rotterdam.  In  France,  during  the  conflict  between  Louis  XI 
and  Charles  of  Burgundy,  there  occur  several  indications  that 
the  future  triumph  of  the  Renascence  was  preparing :  Terence 
was  done  into  French  for  the  king,  and  a  fresh  translation  of 
Ovid's  "  Metamorphoses  "  was  made,  while  for  the  duke  Quin- 
tus  Curtius'  life  of  Alexander  and  Caesar's  "  Commentaries  " 
were  translated.  In  the  year  1483  a  romance  based  upon  the 
JEneid  appeared  in  print. 

In  1465  died  Charles,  duke  of  Orleans, — a  poet  whose 
work  belongs  to  the  past  generation,  when  Louis  XI  was  yet 
Dauphin,  but  who  may  be  placed  here  because  he  illustrates 
well  an  intellectual  attitude  that  greatly  furthers  political  abso- 
lutism like  Louis'  —  a  tendency  of  cultivated  minds,  enamoured 
of  beauty  and  pleasure,  to  abstract  themselves  in  stormy 
periods  from  all  interest  and  interference  in  public  affairs,  and 
to  create  for  themselves  worlds  apart  where,  as  Charles  himself 
urged,  they  can  think  at  their  ease,  and  banish  care  and  sad- 
ness. In  the  present  case,  this  attitude  of  mind  excites  no 


158  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

wonder  :  the  duke  of  Orleans  had  had  his  full  share  of  the 
tribulations  of  his  disastrous  time.  Taken  captive  at  Agincourt 
and  detained  long  years  in  England,  when  he  was  allowed  to 
return  he  secluded  himself  in  his  chateau  at  Blois  amid  a  world 
of  music  and  song,  and  practised  poetical  composition  in  the 
pretty,  artificial  forms  then  in  vogue.  Among  his  gay  and 
dainty  little  verses  those  on  the  changing  seasons  of  the  year 
are  especially  pleasing.  The  representative  poet  of  the  reign 
of  Louis  XI  was  one  much  younger  than  he,  and  of  a  condition 
of  life  as  different  as  could  be  imagined  —  "a  poor  little  scholar 
who  was  called  Francois  Villon  "  —  the  poet  of  the  Paris  streets. 
A  spendthrift  and  libertine,  he  was  acquainted  with  all  the 
profligacy,  penury,  squalor,  and  misery  of  the  worst  purlieus  of 
the  Paris  of  his  time.  Yet  he  was  bred  for  better  things  and 
had  something  of  an  education,  —  and  the  contrast  between 
what  was  and  what  might  have  been  made  him  wretched. 
When  he  thought  of  it  he  spoke  out  with  a  passion  of  regret  or 
a  settled  sadness  that  brought  into  French  poetry  a  new  and 
thrilling  note  of  personal  experience  and  appeal.  The  upshot 
of  it  all  was  his  resignation  in  thought  to  a  cheerless  fatalism, 

—  he  would  make  the  stars  responsible  for  his  faults  :  "  I  am 
a  sinner,  I  know  it  well,"  he  cries,  "  and  what  the  planets  have 
made  me  I  shall  be."      In  other    moods   an  experience  like 
his  gives   rise   to   satirical  reflections;    much  of  his  work  is 
instinct  with  that  spirit  of  satire  that  was  characteristic  of  the 
period  and  grew  sharper  as  the  century  grew  older.     A  notable 
expression  of  it  is  the  cynical  "  Fifteen   Joys   of  Marriage  " 
an  attack  on  women  —  a  prose  work  ascribed  to  Antoine  de  la 
Salle,  who  is  believed  also  to  have  had  a  hand  in  composing  a 
famous  set  of  prose  tales,  the  "  Cent  Nouvelles    Nouvelles," 

—  which  Louis  XI  richly  enjoyed. 

The  taste  for  dramatic  representations  continued  unabated, 
and  gave  rise  in  this  period  to  new  forms  of  art.  The  old  mys- 
tery-plays now  rolled  up  into  series  of  huge  bulk,  and  the  great 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  159 

number  of  clever  farces  that  have  been  preserved  from  the  end 
of  the  fifteenth  century  proves  that  these  were  a  favorite  form 
of  popular  diversion. 

Such,  in  sum,  is  the  historical  and  literary  setting  of  the 
dynasty  of  York. 

The  years  of  Edward  IV's  reign  —  1461  to  1483  —  exactly 
coincided  with  those  of  his  French  rival,  Louis  XI.  The  two 
halves  of  the  fifteenth  century  do  not  offer  a  contrast  more 
vivid  than  that  that  Edward  offered,  in  aspect  and  character,  to 
the  poor  king  whom  he  displaced  —  a  man  weak  in  feature, 
intellect,  and  will,  whose  virtues  fitted  him  rather  for  a  cloister 
than  a  throne.  Edward  was  a  youth  of  nineteen  years  when  he 
assumed  the  crown.  He  was  the  handsomest  prince  of  his 
time  :  Comynes  assures  us  that  he  was  the  handsomest  man  he 
ever  saw.  He  was  vigorous,  a  good  fighter,  devoted  to  pleasure, 
luxurious,  lascivious  even,  and  cruel  on  occasion,  as  men  of  his 
stamp  generally  are.  His  accession  signified  the  triumph  of 
the  principle  of  legitimacy,  of  natural  right,  over  parliamentary 
enactment,  by  which  the  House  of  Lancaster  held.  Royal 
authority  was  now  in  the  ascendant ;  parliamentary  power 
declined.  Edward  had  large  possessions  in  his  own  right  and 
was  further  enriched,  after  his  success  at  Towton,  by  the 
estates  of  a  host  of  attainted  lords  and  gentry ;  parliament, 
moreover,  helped  him  to  greater  independence  and  diminished 
its  own  consequence  by  granting  him  the  customs  (now  increas- 
ing in  productiveness)  once  for  all,  for  the  term  of  his  life.  As 
a  result  of  this  and  of  the  peace  with  France  it  was  rarely 
summoned  during  his  reign.  To  balance  this  constitutional 
regression  there  came  about  a  signal  development  of  law,  its 
practice  and  interpretation,  —  a  condition  of  things  character- 
istic of  strong  reigns  :  Louis  XI  ever  sought  to  give  his 
arbitrary  acts  a  color  of  legality.  In  1461  the  first  solicitor- 
general  of  the  crown  was  appointed  ;  in  1471  the  first  attorney- 
general.  In  John  Markham,  a  consistent  Yorkist,  Edward 


160  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

found  a  useful  ally,  and  he  was  appointed  chief  justice  of 
the  Court  of  King's  Bench  ;  but  because  he  would  not  go  the 
length  the  king  wished  in  straining  the  law  to  suit  his  ends  he 
had  to  make  way,  toward  the  middle  of  the  reign,  for  a  more 
pliant  tool  of  power,  Thomas  Billing,  who  balked  at  nothing  so 
it  pleased  the  king.  The  latter  part  of  the  reign  was  adorned 
by  the  labors  of  the  learned  jurists  Sir  John  Fortescue  and 
Thomas  Littleton.  In  1481  Littleton's  famous  treatise  "On 
Tenures"  was  printed.  It  was  couched  in  the  old  French  of 
the  law-courts  and  was  divided  into  three  parts,  treating 
respectively  of  tenancies  in  general,  —  of  the  rights  and  duties 
of  lords  and  tenants,  —  and  of  means  of  acquiring  and  surren- 
dering rights  in  land.  It  was  the  first  work  of  the  kind  in 
England,  and  so  clear  were  its  definitions,  so  thorough  its 
analysis,  so  systematic  its  arrangement,  that  it  aroused  real 
enthusiasm  in  the  profession,  —  an  enthusiasm  that  may  be 
gauged  by  the  fact  that  William  Hussey,  Edward's  attorney- 
general  and  last  chief-justice,  got  it  by  heart.  Fortescue  was 
a  faithful  Lancastrian.  He  had  been  Henry  VPs  sergeant  and 
chief- justice,  and  after  the  battle  of  Towton,  in  which  he  took 
part,  he  fled  with  Margaret  and  her  little  son  to  Scotland  and 
suffered  attainder.  He  accompanied  the  queen  in  her  wander- 
ings upon  the  continent  as  tutor  to  the  prince,  for  whom  he 
composed,  in  Latin,  his  "  Praises  of  the  Laws  of  England." 
After  the  extinction  of  the  male  line  of  the  house  of  Lan- 
caster in  1471  he  gave  in  his  submission  to  Edward  IV 
and  his  attainder  was  reversed.  About  this  time,  probably,  he 
wrote  his  treatise,  in  twenty  short  chapters  "  On  the  Govern- 
ance of  England."  In  this  work  he  had  the  courage  to  use 
English.  He  begins  by  drawing  a  comparison  between  abso- 
lute and  constitutional  monarchy  and  their  effects  as  exhibited 
in  France  and  England  respectively,  —  goes  on  to  show  the 
necessity  of  an  ample  revenue  for  the  king,  greater  than  that 
of  any  subject, — discusses  the  means  of  raising  it,  —  and 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  161 

winds  up  with  a  recommendation  (acted  upon  later)  to  form  a 
body  of  councillors  who  should  advise  the  king  in  financial 
matters  especially. 

We  have  spoken  of  the  increasing  value  of  the  customs  :  it 
sometimes  seems  as  if  the  most  significant  feature  of  the  revo- 
lution that  raised  the  house  of  York  to  power  is  that  it  was  a 
victory  of  the  townsfolk,  artisans,  traders  —  of  what  is  called 
the  middle  class.  Great  advances  were  now  made  in  commerce 
and  manufactures  :  English  merchants  began  to  compete  with 
the  men  of  the  Hanse  towns  even  in  the  Baltic  Sea  :  for  the 
encouragement  of  home-industry  a  highly  protective  statute  was 
passed  in  1463  by  which  importation  of  woollen  and  leather 
goods  and  specified  articles  of  hardware  was  forbidden.  For 
the  farmer's  benefit  a  corn-law  was  also  passed  forbidding  the 
importation  of  wheat  when  it  was  under  a  specified  market 
price.  Artisans  and  manufacturers  prospered  in  this  period  — 
their  work  was  well  paid  for,  their  hours  of  labor  were  few ; 
rural  laborers  on  the  contrary  suffered,  their  day  was  long,  their 
wages  were  low.  Little  by  little  the  farm-lands  of  England 
were  being  converted  into  pasture,  into  enormous  sheep-walks, 
to  supply  the  great  English  staple,  wool,  — in  constant  demand 
in  foreign  markets. 

It  was  some  time  before  the  nature  of  the  new  monarchy  was 
fully  disclosed ;  at  first  it  seemed  allied  in  policy  as  well  as 
by  blood  and  fellowship  in  arms  with  the  great  house  of  Neville 
and  its  head,  the  popular  and  powerful  earl  of  Warwick,  the 
full-blown  flower  of  the  feudal  age.  We  have  not  in  our 
possession  every  link  in  the  chain  of  events  that  led  up  to 
the  inevitable  crisis,  the  mortal  conflict  between  the  new 
monarchy  and  the  old  feudalism  on  Barnet  field.  Edward's 
marriage  with  the  beautiful  young  widow,  Elizabeth  (Wood- 
ville)  Grey,  made  known  in  the  fall  of  the  year  1464,  is  com- 
monly held  to  have  begun  the  breach,  which  was  widened  by 
the  favor  shown  the  new  queen's  relatives  and  by  another 


162  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

marriage,  that  of  the  king's  sister  Margaret  and  Charles  of 
Burgundy  —  brought  about  by  the  Woodville  interest  in  1467. 
On  both  occasions  Warwick  was  planning  a  French  match,  for 
he  favored  alliance  with  Louis  XI ;  in  the  latter  instance  he 
was  cruelly  discredited,  for  he  had  already  begun  negotiations 
with  the  French  king.  The  antagonism  of  sentiments  and 
ideas  grew  keener  ;  in  the  summer  of  1469  Warwick  gave  proof 
of  his  power,  actually  making  the  king  his  captive  —  but  soon 
released  him.  It  is  unnecessary  to  search  for  the  disgusts  that 
hurried  on  the  final  catastrophe :  Edward  was  restive  under 
his  great  vassal's  overshadowing  influence  and  Warwick 
divined  that  the  king's  policy  was  inimical  to  his  whole  system. 
In  1470  he  rose  again  ;  but  this  time  Edward  was  prepared  and 
the  earl  had  to  take  refuge  in  France.  There  his  affiliations 
underwent  a  radical  change ;  he  turned  Lancastrian,  was  recon- 
ciled to  Margaret  of  Anjou,  and  contracted  his  daughter  to  her 
son,  to  whom  he  pledged  the  crown  of  England  after  the  demise 
of  Henry  VI.  Surprising  as  this  change  of  connection  was,  we 
yet  feel  that  there  was  an  inner  fitness  in  it ;  it  was  the  des- 
perate embrace  of  the  Lancastrian  and  the  feudal  cause, 
destined  to  sink  together.  With  aid  from  Louis  XI  which  he 
hardly  needed,  so  popular  was  he,  Warwick  landed  in  England 
in  September;  in  a  few  days  he  was  at  the  head  of  a  large 
army ;  Edward  was  deserted  and  fled  with  his  brother  Richard 
on  fleet  horses  to  Lynn  just  in  time  to  escape  on  a  ship 
bound  for  Holland  where  he  arrived  with  no  other  possessions 
than  the  clothes  he  wore.  Warwick  now  had  Henry  VI  pro- 
claimed and  reigned  in  his  name  for  half  a  year.  But  in  the 
spring  of  1471  came  the  amend  :  with  some  little  help  from  his 
brother-in-law,  Charles  the  Bold,  Edward  returned,  nominally 
to  recover  his  duchy,  really  to  try  his  fortune  once  more ;  finding 
the  way  clear  he  pushed  on  to  London  and  was  warmly  wel- 
comed by  the  citizens.  Turning  back  he  encountered  Warwick 
at  Barnet  and  in  the  sanguinary  battle  that  followed  the  great 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  163 

earl  fell.  Edward  promptly  marched  across  the  kingdom  to 
meet  Margaret  of  Anjou  who  had  landed  in  the  west,  defeated 
her  at  Tewkesbury  and  caused  the  prince  her  son  to  be  slain. 
Immediately  after  Henry  VI  perished  in  the  Tower,  —  and 
Edward  was  sole  master  in  the  kingdom.  His  restoration 
was  the  triumph  of  London  and  of  trade  :  the  Hanse  merchants 
had  contributed  toward  it  and  as  a  reward  he  confirmed  their 
privileges  in  London  and  granted  them  beside  factories  at 
Lynn  and  Boston.  Another  point  deserves  notice,  —  his  victo- 
ries were  won  with  gunpowder.  By  this  time  the  long-standing 
prejudice  against  that  medium  was  wearing  out ;  its  use  was 
pretty  well  understood  and  was  henceforth  constant  —  and  the 
relics  of  feudalism  were  wiped  away. 

The  sun  of  York  was  now  supreme  in  an  unclouded  heaven 
and  the  king,  freed  from  every  rival,  every  apprehension,  in  the 
pride  of  youth  and  conquest  and  a  power  greater  perhaps  than 
any  of  his  predecessors  had  ever  enjoyed,  gave  himself  up  to 
the  pursuit  of  pleasure,  and  tournaments,  hunting-parties  and 
banqueting  were  the  order  of  the  day.  A  type  of  the  new 
nobility  was  the  head  of  the  family  of  Howard  which  now 
rose  into  prominence :  Edward  created  him  duke  of  Norfolk 
and  showered  offices  upon  him.  But  the  particular  ornament 
of  the  court,  —  the  mirror  of  courtesy,  of  elegant  tastes  and 
chivalrous  manners,  —  was  the  queen's  brother,  Anthony  Wood- 
ville,  Caxton's  patron ;  and  second  only  to  him  came  the  lord 
Hastings.  As  an  instance  of  the  refinement,  the  intellectual 
atmosphere  of  the  court,  we  note  that  the  first  royal  poet- 
laureate  in  England  was  appointed  in  this  reign,  —  a  writer  of 
Latin  verse  named  John  Kay.  A  scarce  perceptible  dawn 
of  « new  learning '  began  to  spread  as  a  slender  succession  of 
scholars  returned  from  Italy,  some  of  them  bringing  manu- 
scripts. Thus  the  downfall  of  scholasticism  was  heralded ;  but 
the  humanists  were  not  numerous  or  influential  enough  to 
stamp  the  age,  —  it  was  Caxton  rather  and  the  mediaeval  themes 


164  OUTLINE   OF  THE  PHILOSOPHY 

over  which  he  labored  that  gave  it  its  literary  character.  In 
1477  he  introduced  the  art  of  printing  into  England,  —  an 
event  sufficient  of  itself  to  make  the  reign  illustrious. 

We  have  seen  English  used  for  the  first  time  in  the  discus- 
sion of  problems  in  political  philosophy  by  Sir  John  Fortescue  ; 
he  was  preceded  by  several  years  in  this  serious  use  of  the 
mother  tongue  by  Bishop  Pecock,  —  against  whom  this  very 
indictment  was  brought  by  his  enemies,  that  he  wrote  in 
English.  As  a  result  he  is  vindicated  to-day  with  acclamation 
and  his  enemies  are  put  to  confusion,  —  their  memories  are 
only  revived  to  be  covered  with  contempt  and  consigned 
again  to  oblivion  while  his  "  Represser  "  stands  forth  a  model 
of  argumentative  composition  and  without  question  the  most 
considerable  work  produced  in  England  in  the  course  of  the 
fifteenth  century.  At  first  it  seems  difficult  to  place  him  :  he 
was  rejected  by  the  Lancastrians  and  his  case  was  not  bettered 
by  the  revolution  that  put  Edward  IV  on  the  throne  :  in  1476 
we  find  that  king,  who  in  such  matters  took  his  cue  from  the 
opinion  of  those  about  him,  commending  the  authorities  at 
Oxford  for  suppressing  Pecock's  works  and  bidding  them 
withhold  the  degree  of  doctor  in  divinity  from  some  theologian 
who  was  believed  to  have  been  infected  with  his  obnoxious 
ideas.  But  the  fact  that  his  books  were  circulating  at  the 
university  and  making  many  converts  during  this  reign  makes 
their  examination  fitting  at  this  point ;  the  title  of  his  principal 
tractate,  moreover,  is  a  helpful  indication,  —  it  was  intended 
to  "repress"  the  Lollards,  to  put  a  stop  to  their  fault-finding 
with  the  church  clergy,  —  an  end  pretty  effectually  realized  by 
Edward  IV  :  it  is  a  remarkable  fact  that  after  his  accession  the 
Lollards  subsided,  disappeared  beneath  the  surface  ;  the  church 
was  heartily  Yorkist  and  held  to  the  monarch  a  relation  of 
close  and  mutual  support.  More  than  all  we  feel  in  the 
bishop's  work  the  breath  of  the  new  epoch ;  he  occupied  in 
truth  a  transitional  position.  His  fate  was  that  of  most  com- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  165 

prehensive  minds,  —  to  be  misunderstood  and  abused  on  all 
sides,  —  proof  enough  of  the  independence  and  originality  of 
his  views.  His  tolerance  —  extraordinary  in  that  age, — his 
willingness  to  see  what  was  good  in  the  contentions  even  of 
his  opponents,  his  desire  to  do  justice  to  all  parties,  —  his 
recognition  of  the  claims  of  the  papacy,  the  English  church, 
and  the  Lollards,  —  brought  it  to  pass  that  he  was  suspected 
and  hated  by  all.  His  work  was  of  deep  significance,  for  it 
was  instinct  with  that  fine  humanity,  that  respect  for  ancient 
usages  which  yet  does  not  preclude  all  timely  change,  that 
loyalty  to  Scripture,  that  large  reasonableness,  fairness  in  dis- 
cussion, soundness  of  mind  and  heart,  that  came  to  be  known 
later  as  the  spirit  of  Anglicanism,  —  a  truly  catholic  spirit. 

Beside  his  "  Represser  "  Pecock  wrote  in  English  a  grammar 
of  morals  which  he  called  his  "  Donet  "  and  a  "  Treatise  on 
Faith  "  in  which  he  met  the  Lollards  half  way,  admitting  that 
Scripture  is  the  rule  of  faith.  He  also  wrote  "  Of  Matrimony" 
and  projected  a  work  on  logic. 

His  relation  to  the  ages  of  religious  thought  that  we  have 
traversed  may  be  stated  thus.  It  will  be  remembered  that  in 
past  centuries  the  reason  had  been  held  to  be  a  useful  organ 
of  religious  knowledge,  competent  to  prove  some  if  not  all  of 
the  fundamental  doctrines  of  Christianity ;  that  later  it  had  been 
discredited  and  the  authority  of  the  church  had  been  declared 
the  ground  of  faith  ;  and  that  finally  the  Bible  had  been  set 
over  against  that  authority  as  the  sole  depository  of  unadul- 
terated truth.  It  was  left  for  Pecock  at  the  close  of  these 
ages  to  combine  the  results  of  all  and  to  set  forth  with  vary- 
ing degrees  of  clearness  and  consistency,  the  reason,  the  Bible, 
and  the  church  as  the  threefold  root  of  religious  knowledge. 
Thus  he  curiously  exemplified  in  his  theological  culture  the 
composite  character  of  the  age ;  but  as  has  been  shown  by 
reason  of  its  strenuous  reaction  against  Wyclif's  ideas  the  age 
was  one-sided  and  intolerant  in  regard  to  the  Bible  and  so 


166  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

could  not  appreciate  Pecock's  liberal  attitude ;  and  though  his 
defence  of  the  constitution  of  the  church  and  certain  of  its 
popular  practices  was  agreeable  to  some  it  displeased  others 
by  its  moderation,  —  and  all  took  alarm  at  his  appeal  to  the 
reason. 

The  "  Represser  "  falls  into  two  main  divisions,  the  first  part 
general,  clearing  the  ground  and  establishing  principles,  the 
second  particular,  applying  those  principles  to  some  special 
usages  chiefly  objected  to  by  the  Lollards.  It  begins  by  setting 
forth  three  radical  errors  of  theirs  :  (i)  That  no  ordinance  is 
of  God  that  cannot  be  found  in  the  Bible  (some  are  so 
"smart  and  wanton "  as  to  ask  of  any  usage  they  dislike, 
"Where  groundest  thou  it  in  Holy  Scripture?");  (2)  That  any 
humble  Christian  can  discover  the  true  sense  of  any  passage  in 
the  Bible ;  (3)  That  when  that  sense  is  thus  gained  one  should 
not  listen  to  any  argument  about  it.  Then  follows  the  doctrine 
of  the  reason ;  it  is  not  the  office  of  Scripture  to  establish  any 
law  or  truth  that  reason  may  discover.  The  Moral  Law  is  of 
equal  authority  with  Scripture  :  upon  it  temperance,  justice, 
and  reverence  toward  God  are  based ;  it  is  the  law  "of  kind," 
of  nature, — the  "doom"  or  judgment  of  natural  reason,— 
written  in  men's  souls  by  the  finger  of  God ;  it  is  the  *  print 
and  image  of  God,'  not  grounded  on  the  Bible  but  presup- 
posed by  it,  to  be  dutifully  kept  by  men  though  there  were  no 
Bible  —  as  was  the  case,  for  instance,  before  Abraham's  time. 
The  principles  of  morals  are  not  founded  upon  any  words  of 
Christ  but  were  presupposed  by  him.  Whenever  there  seems 
to  be  a  conflict  concerning  a  point  of  morals  between  the  out- 
ward letter  and  the  law  within  the  heart  the  former  must  be 
harmonized  with  the  latter  for  that  is  of  absolute  obligation. 
And  the  larger  part  of  God's  law  is  written  on  the  heart ; 
acquaintance  with  moral  philosophy,  therefore,  is  necessary  to 
Christians.  Let  none  disparage  or  seek  to  diminish  that 
"  inward  Scripture."  Next,  as  to  the  Bible  ;  it  certifies  to  truths 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  167 

intuitively  derived,  publishes  anew  the  moral  law,  and  estab- 
lishes beside  points  of  faith,  some  of  which  are  laws  (as,  for 
instance,  baptism),  and  some  not  (as  historical  facts).  Pecock 
would  not  forbid  the  laity  to  read  the  Bible  ;  he  pays  by  the 
way  this  fine  tribute  to  Wyclif's  version  :  the  Scripture  in  the 
mother  tongue  is  delectable  and  sweet  and  draws  men  to  devo- 
tion and  love  of  God,  —  hence  it  is  esteemed  beyond  reason. 
Many  lawful  things  are  not  ordained  or  even  mentioned  in  it, 
—  as  articles  of  clothing,  cooking,  clocks,  translations  of  itself, 
shaving,  laughing,  singing,  quoit-throwing,  ale  and  beer-making 
(much  worse  than  images!).  "Vain,  disputatious  women  appeal 
to  express  statements  of  Scripture  :  how,  then,  dare  they  wear 
kerchiefs  or  wash  and  anoint  themselves  ?  They  may  not 
adduce  the  example  of  Susannah  for  that  is  an  apocryphal 
book!"  The  Lollards'  argument  from  the  sole  authority  of 
Scripture  is  thus  reduced  to  absurdity  and  they  are  brought 
back  to  reason.  From  laymen's  conflicting  interpretations  and 
quarrels  over  the  sense  of  Holy  Writ  is  deduced  the  need  of  a 
learned  ministry ;  and  from  the  divisions  among  the  sectaries 
is  drawn  a  powerful  argument  for  the  authority  of  the  church. 
"  You  Bible-men  differ,  —  some  of  you  are  called  Opinion- 
holders,  some  Neutrals ;  you  are  full  of  schism,  —  ought  you 
not  to  admit  the  doom  of  reason  and  return  to  the  catholic  and 
general  faith  and  lore  of  the  church  ?  " 

In  the  second  division  of  his  work  the  bishop  applies  himself 
to  a  defence  of  eleven  points  in  the  constitution  or  practice  of 
the  church  which  were  commonly  brought  in  question  by  the 
Lollards.  It  is  interesting  to  learn  that  these  were  the  use  of 
images,  pilgrimages,  property  in  land,  the  hierarchy,  ecclesias- 
tical laws,  religious  orders,  invocation  of  saints,  costly  church 
ornament,  the  mass,  taking  of  oaths,  and  maintaining  the  law- 
fulness of  war  and  capital  punishment.  He  opens  his  defence 
with  a  philosophical  classification  of  the  whole  body  of 
knowledge  according  to  its  derivation  (i)  from  reason,  which 


168  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

is  Philosophy,  (2)  from  revelation,  by  testimony,  apprehended 
by  faith,  —  that  is,  Theology.  Further,  all  truth  may  be  classed 
as  either  "  speculable  "  or  "  doable  "  (practical)  ;  and  the  latter 
may  be  distributed  into  actions  approved,  forbidden,  or  left 
undetermined  by  faith  and  reason,  —  that  is,  actions  lawful, 
unlawful,  or  indifferent  —  and  those  of  the  last  class  may  gen- 
erally be  considered  lawful.  Any  who  deny  these  distinctions 
are  out  of  the  pale  of  argument.  Herein  the  bishop  forces  into 
clear  relief  the  nature  of  the  difference  between  his  and  the 
church's  view  of  the  Bible  and  the  Lollard  view ;  they  may  be 
distinguished  as  broad  and  narrow ;  according  to  the  former  all 
usages  are  lawful  that  are  not  forbidden  by  Scripture,  —  accord- 
ing to  the  latter  none  are  lawful  that  Scripture  does  not  enjoin. 
One  by  one  the  points  above  mentioned  are  passed  in  review ; 
the  procedure  is  simple,  —  it  is  to  bring  each  to  the  dual  test 
of  reason  and  the  Word  of  God.  The  first  matter  in  dispute  is 
the  use  of  images  ;  it  is  usual  but  not  apposite  to  refer  to  the 
second  commandment  as  condemning  these ;  in  fact  it  con- 
demns idols  only,  not  images  used  as  "  minding  signs."  These 
are  approved  by  Scripture,  —  God  himself  commanded  the 
brazen  serpent  to  be  made,  the  cherubim,  the  bosses  and 
images  of  the  Temple ;  Christ  used  money  stamped  with 
Caesar's  image.  Crucifixes  therefore  are  lawful.  Reason, 
moreover,  does  not  forbid  them,  for  no  one  in  his  senses  wor- 
ships them  or  supposes  that  any  divine  virtue  inheres  in  them  ; 
nor  are  they  to  be  put  out  because  some  abuse  them  to  super- 
stition, for  other  good  things  are  subject  to  abuse,  —  the  Bible 
in  English  for  instance  !  To  use  "  seeable,  rememorative 
signs,"  such  as  the  sacraments  are  is  both  permissible  and 
helpful  ;  they  assist  the  memory  like  a  knot  in*  one's  girdle,  — 
they  are  like  portraits  of  dead  or  absent  friends.  Pilgrimages 
when  tried  by  Scripture  and  reason  are  not  found  lacking,  — 
the  women  who  visited  the  sepulchre  very  early  in  the  morning 
were  pilgrims,  —  and  though  these  too  are  liable  to  abuse  yet 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  169 

when  rightly  used  they  quicken  devotion.  But  the  Lollards 
contend  that  the  Bible  and  preaching  are  better  reminders  than 
images  and  pilgrimages  and  that  living  men  are  better  repre- 
sentations of  Christ  "  than  is  any  unquick  stock  or  stone  graved 
and  orned  with  gold  and  other  gay  paintures  "  and  that  God  is 
equally  present  everywhere  so  that  one  place  is  no  holier  than 
another.  But  this  is  not  true  :  "God  chooseth  to  give  his  grace 
one  place  before  another,  therefore  that  place  is  holier."  Such 
a  spot  was  Bethel,  —  and  Jacob  said,  dreading :  "  How 
gastful  is  this  place ! "  And  out  of  the  bush  God  said  to  Moses  : 
"Undo  the  shoes  off  thy  feet  for  the  place  in  which  thou 
standest  is  holy  land."  Again,  the  Bible  is  a  "hearable  "  not 
a  "  seeable  "  sign  of  the  Lord,  and  a  glance  of  the  eye  brings 
to  mind  much  and  long  matter  more  quickly  and  easily  than 
hearing  and  reading  do  —  and  there  are  many  who  cannot 
read.  Finally,  an  image  must  resemble  its  object  and  nothing 
else,  and  no  living  man  can  represent  Christ  as  truly  as  a 
crucifix  does.  Here  is  the  conclusion  of  the  matter:  "what- 
ever reason  deemeth  to  be  done  is  moral  law  of  God  and  his 
pleasant  service  even  in  case  it  cannot  be  found  specially  wit- 
nessed to  by  Holy  Scripture."  A  digression  on  the  origin  of 
idolatry  follows ;  Pecock  thinks  it  began  in  the  worship  not  of 
dead  men  but  of  the  stars.  The  third  point,  as  to  ecclesias- 
tical rights  in  land :  some  of  the  laity  declare  that  those  who 
defend  them  are  in  a  state  of  damnation.  Yet  such  holdings 
are  not  condemned  in  either  testament :  the  Levites  were 
endowed  with  forty-eight  cities ;  and  if  Christ's  example  of 
poverty  be  of  universal  obligation  so  also  should  his  celibacy 
be.  Human  law  does  not  forbid  endowments.  The  bishop  has 
a  fling  at  Wyclif's  doctrine  of  dominion  :  "  a  clerk  —  verily  to 
say  a  heretic" — asserts  that  if  the  clergy  misapply  their 
property  the  temporal  lords  may  take  it  away :  but  the  evil 
deeds  of  an  unfaithful  servant  should  not  prejudice  his  inno- 
cent heir  for  otherwise  bad  kings  might  be  similarly  deprived. 


170  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

Further :  some  of  the  laity  say  that  all  ranks  above  the  priest- 
hood —  bishops,  archbishops,  patriarchs,  the  pope  —  are  anti- 
Christian  ;  yet  they  are  not  forbidden  by  reason  or  Scripture,  — 
remember  the  Jewish  high-priest  and  Christ's  appointment  of 
Peter.  The  remaining  points  are  briefly  treated,  —  the  method 
of  disposing  of  them  had  been  amply  illustrated  and  the  bishop 
was  growing  tired  of  the  discussion.  Some  call  religious  orders 
devilish;  yet  they  are  not  prohibited  by  Scripture.  It  is 
objected  that  they  were  not  instituted  by  Christ,  —  neither  was 
the  Lord  Mayor  of  London.  The  habits  of  the  brothers  are 
"seeable  signs,"  like  liveries,  and  in  their  "lordly  mansions" 
they  are  given  to  hospitality.  The  bishop's  last  retort  sounds 
somewhat  flippant :  it  was  in  truth  a  flash  of  not  unjustifi- 
able indignation  at  the  perversity  of  his  opponents'  temper,  — 
one  cannot  call  it  reasoning.  It  is  clear  that  the  pristine 
evangelical  fervor  of  Wyclif's  followers  had  declined  and  that 
the  sect  was  muffling  itself  in  a  mantle  of  legalism,  a  carping 
literalism,  —  the  veriest  formalism,  and  that  of  an  ugly  kind. 
It  was  just  as  well  that  it  should  lift  its  voice  no  more. 

In  writing  his  book  Pecock  evidently  had  access  to  many 
documents  long  since  lost  or  destroyed.  The  "  Represser " 
is  thus  a  precious  record  of  a  highly  important  controversy. 

We  turn  now  to  the  civilization  of  the  age  upon  its  domestic 
and  material  side.  And  here  we  are  exceedingly  fortunate 
in  possessing  a  mass  of  correspondence  that  brings  the  times 
of  Edward  IV  before  us  with  the  vividness  of  lightning.  The 
letters  of  the  Paston  family  present  us  pictures  of  real  life  so 
broad  and  animated  and  full  of  detail  that  they  transport  us 
into  the  period  with  an  immediacy  quite  unprecedented.  This 
remarkable  collection  begins  well  back  in  the  reign  of  Henry 
VI  but  is  most  intimately  associated  with  the  following  reign 
for  it  attains  its  greatest  interest  and  volume  during  the  time 
that  Sir  John  Paston  figures  upon  the  scene.  He  was  the 
same  age  as  Edward  and  the  companion  of  his  revels  ;  and 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  171 

after  his  death  at  the  end  of  the  year  1479  the  correspondence 
loses  its  vivacity  and  gradually  dwindles  away.  In  the  epistles 
of  the  sportive  knight  we  get  an  inkling  as  to  the  license  in 
speech  and  manners  of  the  boon  companions  of  the  king.  A 
rueful  remark  of  his  after  the  battle  of  Barnet  shows  us 
what  men  of  the  world  inferred  from  the  recent  course  of 
events  as  to  the  divine  government  in  general :  it  seemed  to 
them  sheer  caprice :  "God  hath  showed  himself  marvellously 
like  Him  that  made  all  and  can  undo  again  when  him  list,  — 
and  I  can  think  that  by  all  likelihood  shall  know  Himself  as 
marvellous  again  and  that  in  short  time."  The  fact  that  Sir 
John  had  turned  Lancastrian  after  Edward's  flight  the  year 
before  gives  point  to  the  sentiment.  In  her  correspondence 
extending  over  forty  years  his  mother,  Margaret  Paston,  sus- 
tains the  reputation  of  her  sex  in  the  art  of  letter-writing  ;  he 
furnishes  the  high-lights,  the  glimpses  of  a  courtier's  life,  —  she 
puts  in  the  shadows,  and  some  of  them  are  black  indeed,  — 
the  vexations,  difficulties,  and  dangers  of  a  country  gentle- 
woman's life  in  the  epoch  of  the  Wars  of  the  Roses.  We  com- 
miserate her  anxieties, — the  constant  hard  times,  the  difficulty 
of  getting  in  the  rents,  the  neighborly  quarrels,  the  general 
insecurity;  we  shudder  at  deeds  of  violence  committed  on 
property  and  person,  at  mention  of  the  thieves  that  prowl  by 
the  highways,  at  fearful  visitations  of  the  plague.  Looking 
through  these  letters  and  the  documents  found  among  them 
we  can  see  the  cottages  of  the  peasantry  in  a  wretched  state 
of  disrepair:  well  for  the  poor  people  if  they  can  get  rushes 
from  the  lord's  marsh  and  windfallen  sticks  from  his  trees  to 
mend  them  with!  —  and  little  wonder  that  in  these  forlorn 
haunts,  living  on  unwholesome  and  often  scanty  food,  they 
suffer  from  fevers,  scurvy,  and  leprosy.  Up  at  the  hall  if  it 
be  late  autumn  we  can  see  them  laying  in  the  winter's  supply 
of  beef;  can  watch  the  swing  of  the  butcher's  axe,  the  liberal 
use  of  the  salt-bushel,  and  see  the  salting-tubs  and  barrels 


172  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

ranged  in  the  larder ;  if  it  be  late  in  the  winter  we  note  the 
arrival  of  a  horse-load  of  herring  and  some  eels  as  a  Lenten 
supply.  Passing  through  the  kitchen  we  mark  the  yawning 
fireplace  well-furnished  with  its  "great  brass  pot,"  caldron, 
spits,  flesh-hook,  pot-hook,  and  other  utensils,  mortars  and 
pestles  both  brass  and  stone ;  and  in  the  buttery  may  inspect 
the  gallon  bottles,  leather  pots,  wooden  trenchers,  pewter 
basins,  ewers,  and  candlesticks,  the  silver  spoons  and  dishes, 
some  chased  and  bordered  with  gilt,  the  precious  pottlers 
enameled  with  violets  and  daisies,  the  salt-cellar  "like  a  bas- 
tille "  gilt  with  roses.  The  living  rooms  seem  to  our  eyes 
scantily  furnished  ;  save  for  the  formidable  array  of  armor  and 
weapons  at  its  upper  end  —  bassinets,  gauntlets,  cuirasses, 
cuishes  and  greaves,  cross-bows,  spear-heads,  swords  and 
guns  —  used  moreover  not  long  since  to  protect  the  manor  from 
assault,  —  the  great  hall  has  nothing  in  it  but  a  long  table, 
some  chairs  or  benches,  and  a  pair  of  andirons,  tongs  and  fire 
shovel.  The  walls  are  lined  with  arras  and  pieces  of  tapestry 
curiously  embroidered  :  one  has  on  it  a  hawking-scene,  another 
a  group  of  archers  shooting  birds  with  cross-bows,  another,  a 
lady  harping  by  a  castle,  another,  a  savage  with  a  child  in  his 
arms,  —  these  last  being  subjects  drawn,  no  doubt,  from  old 
romances.  The  bed-rooms  have  one  or  two  chairs  each,  a  fire- 
pan, tongs  and  bellows,  —  but  the  one  piece  of  furniture  is  the 
bed,  with  tester  and  curtains  of  linen  or  say  (a  necessary 
defence  against  draughts),  fine  sheets,  fustian  blankets,  silken 
coverlets  and  down-pillows  cased  in  green  or  purple  silk  or  the 
rare  magnificence  of  red  velvet.  Next  we  may  inspect  the 
wardrobe  —  the  splendid  gown  of  cloth  of  gold,  velvet  and 
woollen  gowns  purfled  with  fur,  black  and  purple  girdles  "har- 
nessed with  silver,"  jackets  of  blue,  russet,  red  and  black  velvet 
and  figured  satin,  damask,  deep  green,  scarlet  and  purple 
hoods  and  black  and  scarlet  hose.  The  wardrobe  of  a  young 
student  of  good  family  is  as  follows :  a  short  musterdevelers 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  173 

gown,  —  other  short  gowns,  green  and  blue,  the  latter  made 
out  of  a  silk  dress,  —  one  of  murrey  silk  made  only  a  year 
ago  and  one  of  russet  silk  furred  with  beaver  "was  made 
this  time  two  year."  The  walk  of  letters  was  not  all  of  flowers 
to  this  youth ;  his  mother  or  grandmother  writes  to  ask  if  he 
is  "doing  his  devoir  in  learning"  and  adds,  "if  he  do  not  well 
nor  will  not  amend  pray  [his  tutor]  that  he  will  truly  belash 
him :  so  did  the  last  master  and  the  best  that  ever  he  had  at 
Cambridge." 

Family  relations  were  harsh  and  unlovely,  bearing  the 
impress  of  the  feudal  system:  "homage"  was  rigorously 
exacted  of  the  young  as  is  indicated  by  the  "  lowly  terms  " 
of  address  to  be  met  with  in  the  Paston  letters :  a  daughter 
begins  a  humble  letter  home  with  "  Right  worshipful  and  my 
most  entirely  beloved  mother"  ;  and  Madame  Paston  writes 
with  some  asperity  to  Sir  John  because  he  has  omitted  a  cus- 
tomary form :  "  I  think  ye  set  but  little  by  my  blessing ;  if  ye 
did  ye  would  have  desired  it  in  your  writing  to  me."  Children 
were  felt  to  be  troubles  to  be  "  bestowed "  as  early  as  pos- 
sible ;  it  was  usual  to  send  them  to  serve  in  families  of  dis- 
tinction to  be  taught  good  manners ;  daughters  were  then 
disposed  of  to  the  first  fair  bidder  or  even  offered — as  time 
wore  on  —  with  a  bonus,  and  if  the  heart  of  one  revolted  from 
a  match  arranged  by  her  parents  it  was  of  no  consequence  — 
except  perhaps  a  merciless  beating.  In  one  of  her  epistles 
Mistress  Margaret  urges  her  husband  to  look  out  a  good  mar- 
riage for  his  sister  for  his  mother  is  fain  to  be  delivered  of 
her  :  let  him  inquire  about  widower  Kny vet's  livelihood.  John 
Paston,  a  light-hearted,  careless  boy,  was  often  in  disgrace  ;  we 
have  a  "lowly"  letter  of  his  to  his  displeased  father  and  one 
from  his  mother  on  the  same  occasion  pleading  for  him : 
"  Vouchsafe  to  be  his  good  father  for  I  hope  he  is  chastised." 
Erelong  he  ran  away  and  joined  Edward  IV  ;  his  father  was 
very  angry  and  visited  his  indignation  upon  his  mother  :  she 


174  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

writes,  "I  durst  not  let  him  know  of  the  last  letter  that  ye 
wrote  me  because  he  was  so  sore  displeased  with  me  at  that 
time."  More  than  a  year  passes  and  this  cry  is  wrung  from 
her:  "  I  understand  that  ye  will  not  that  your  son  be  taken  into 
your  hous'e:  for  God's  sake,  sir,  a  pity  on  him,  and  at  the 
reverence  of  God  be  ye  his  good  father,  and  have  a  fatherly 
heart  to  him  —  and  the  blessed  Trinity  have  you  in  His  keep- 
ing." How  pitiable  this  paternal  anger  seems,  seen  in  the 
deep  light  of  four  hundred  years  ! 

'  Romances  (among  them  Guy  of  Warwick,  the  Green  Knight, 
and  the  Belle  Dame  sans  Mercie),  chronicles,  and  lives  of 
.  saints  formed  the  staple  reading  of  the  household.  For  pas- 
times they  had,  indoors,  chess,  cards,  "  playing  at  the  tables," 
music  (harp,  lute,  and  song),  "  disguisings,"  — and  the  ladies 
had,  of  course,  their  embroidery  ;  out  of  doors,  they  pursued 
the  venerable  amusements  of  hawking,  hunting,  and  jousting. 
What  a  far-away,  romantic  sound  has  the  following  piece  of 
news  in  one  of  the  Paston  letters !  —  it  rings  in  the  ear  with  a 
mournful  music  as  out  of  an  infinite  past.  "There  is  one 
come  into  England,  a  knight  out  of  Spain,  with  a  kerchief  of 
pleasance  iwrapped  about  his  arm,  —  the  which  knight  will  run 
a  course  with  a  sharp  spear  for  his  sovereign  lady's  sake." 

Having  finished  our  progress  through  the  hall  we  may  next 
visit  the  chapel  of  the  estate  and  admire  its  appointments  — 
all  the  property  of  the  lord  of  the  manor,  —  the  altar-cloth 
"  with  the  Trinity  in  the  midst,"  the  silver-gilt  crucifix,  silver 
candlesticks,  pyx  and  cruets,  chalice  and  paten,  and  pax  (a 
small  plate  with  a  raised  crucifix  on  it  to  be  passed  round  and 
kissed  during  mass),  the  antiphoners  and  missals  with  silver 
clasps,  —  the  alb,  tunicle,  cope  and  other  vestments.  While 
we  examine  these  we  are  aware  that  the  lady  of  the  manor  has 
sunk  on  her  knees  before  the  altar  and  is  rapidly  running  over 
her  rosary  of  "  chalcedony  beads,  gaudied  with  silver  gilt."  On 
a  Sunday  we  might  hear  a  sermon  on  Lydgate's  text:  "this 
world  is  but  a  thoroughfare  and  full  of  woe." 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  175 

Last  of  all,  and  the  closing  scene  of  this  old-world  history, 
we  are  permitted  to  attend  the  funeral  obsequies  of  the  father 
of  the  family,  We  catch  his  parting  sigh :  "  For  the  more  hasty 
deliverance  of  my  soul  from  the  painful  flames  of  the  fire  of 
Purgatory,  let  them  faithfully  deal  my  goods."  We  mix  in  the 
crowd  of  priests,  friars,  bell-ringers  and  torch-bearers  —  whose 
lights  so  fill  the  church  with  smoke  during  the  dirge  that 
the  windows  have  afterward  to  be  taken  out  to  purify  the  air. 
We  share  the  funeral  baked  meats,  beef,  mutton,  pork  and 
capons:  there  are  also  fish  and  eggs  in  abundance,  barrels  of 
beer,  and  a  "  roundlet  of  red  wine."  In  the  deserted  church  a 
solitary  light  is  burning  over  the  newly  filled  tomb,  which  will 
finally  be  closed  by  a  memorial  slab  with  a  flat  brass  figure 
inlaid. 

It  is  interesting  to  know  that  during  the  most  prolific  years 
of  the  Paston  correspondence  a  similar  revelation  of  home  life 
in  distant  Florence  was  being  made  in  winsome  Italian  by 
Alessandra  degli  Strozzi,  in  her  letters  to  her  exiled  sons.  All 
we  need  do  to  correct  any  exaggerated  estimate  we  may  have 
formed  of  the  Paston  letters  as  literary  productions  is  to  put 
the  best  of  them  side  by  side  with  hers  :  the  English  examples 
have  the  charm  of  perfect  sincerity,  of  unconscious  self-revela- 
tion, but  only  rare  and  accidental  touches  of  any  literary  value  ; 
Madam  Strozzi's  have  also  that  indefinable  charm,  and  her 
letter  on  the  death  of  her  youngest  son  is  an  exquisite  produc- 
tion, rising  a  whole  Apennine  above  the  Paston  lowland :  it  is 
a  pure  and  perfect  blend  of  tender  human  affection  and  divine 
faith. 

The  most  eminent  literary  man  of  the  Yorkist  era  was 
William  Caxton,  merchant,  printer  and  translator.  Because 
he  produced  no  original  work  one  is  apt  to  overlook  his  claim 
to  regard  in  the  history  of  literature.  The  work  he  did  was  of 
great  importance  in  his  age  ;  he  was  its  representative  man  of 
letters  ;  it  was  an  age  not  of  creative  energy  but  of  culture, 


176  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

and  he  responded  perfectly  to  its  demands.  He  was  versed  in 
Latin  and  French  and  put  his  knowledge  to  account  in  multi- 
farious translations  ;  and  as  he  was  guided  in  his  choice  by  the 
desires  of  his  cultivated  public  the  list  of  books  he  published 
is  a  faithful  register  of  the  taste  of  his  time.  Until  his  fiftieth 
year  he  was  known  only  as  a  man  of  affairs  and  a  courtier  :  in 
1465  he  was  made  superintendent  of  the  colony  of  English 
merchants  at  Bruges,  and  he  was  employed  by  Edward  IV  to 
negotiate  a  commercial  treaty  with  the  duke  of  Burgundy.  In 
1471  he  finished  with  the  Duchess  Margaret's  encouragement, 
his  first  translation,  the  "  Recuyell  [or  collection]  of  the  His- 
tories of  Troy."  The  work  was  soon  in  such  demand  that 
enough  copies  could  not  be  supplied  in  manuscript  and  Caxton 
was  glad  to  put  it  into  print  some  three  years  later.  By  that 
time  he  had  finished  his  second  piece  of  literary  labor,  a  trans- 
lation of  a  work  belonging  to  the  end  of  the  thirteenth  century 
—  "The  Game  and  Play  of  the  Chess  Moralized"  —in  which 
under  the  figure  of  the  pieces  of  the  game  and  their  func- 
tions—  king  and  queen,  knights,  rooks,  "alphins,"  and 
pawns  —  the  duties  of  various  ranks  in  the  social  order  are  set 
forth.  After  this  was  printed  he  left  Bruges  and  established 
himself  and  his  press  at  Westminster  where  he  brought  out  in 
1477  "TheDictes  and  Sayings  of  Philosophers"  —the  first 
book  printed  in  England.  The  translating  had  been  done  by 
the  accomplished  Anthony  Woodville.  Henceforth  until  his 
death  fifteen  years  later  Caxton  kept  the  reading  public  supplied 
at  the  rate  of  three  or  four  publications  a  year.  The  most 
significant  thing  in  his  list  of  productions  is  an  omission  : 
there  is  no  Bible  or  portion  of  the  Bible  in  the  mother  tongue 
to  be  found  in  it.  A  Latin  psalter  he  did  print,  and  the 
"  Hours "  according  to  the  use  of  Sarum.  Another  striking 
feature  of  his  work  is  that  beyond  a  version  of  Tully  on  Old 
Age  and  Friendship  it  betrays  hardly  a  trace  of  the  revival  of 
interest  in  classic  authors.  Some  of  it  is  distinctly  practical 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  177 

and  didactic,  as  for  example  a  French  and  English  vocabulary 
for  the  use  of  travellers,  a  Governal  of  Health,  and  books  of 
Courtesy  and  Good  Manners.  The  popularity  of  Lydgate's 
minor  works  is  attested  by  numerous  publications  ;  and  we  find 
translations  of  Alain  Chartier's  letter  on  the  vexations  of  court 
life,  Christine  de  Pisan's  Moral  Proverbs  and  Feats  of  Arms 
and  Chivalry,  and  one  of  those  moral  treatises  belonging  to 
their  time,  a  Chevalier's  advice  to  his  daughters.  Quite  early 
in  his  career  Caxton  published  an  edition  of  the  Canterbury 
Tales  and  followed  it  up  with  other  of  Chaucer's  works,— 
his  version  of  Boethius,  Parlement  of  Fowls,  and  Troilus  and 
Cressida.  He  also  printed  Gower's  Confessio  Amantis.  '  Going 
further  back  in  our  history  we  find  him  selecting  for  translation 
and  publication  an  English  Chronicle,  Reynard  the  Fox,  the 
Golden  Legend  (lives  of  saints),  Bonaventura's  Mirror  of  the 
Life  of  Christ,  —  and  finally  touching  the  spring  of  the  litera- 
ture in  Malory's  great  compilation,  the  Noble  Histories  of  King 
Arthur  and  some  of  his  Knights.  The  worthy  old  printer 
rounded  his  career  appropriately  with  the  sequel  to  the  story 
of  Troy,  bringing  out  his  translation  of  the  French  romance 
drawn  from  the  ^Eneid  ;  in  his  conclusion  he  appeals  to  a 
rising  literary  light,  "  Master  John  Skelton,  poet-laureate  of 
Oxford,"  to  amend  the  work  where  necessary. 

From  this  review  it  appears  that  the  result  of  Caxton's  labors 
was  to  create  a  library  of    mediaeval   literature    for    English 
readers.     His  work  was  to  gather  up   the   literary  treasures 
of  a  closing  cycle.     That  is  the  right  way  to  envisage  it,  - 
as  resulting  in  a  real  mediaeval  encyclopaedia. 

It  is  a  fact  worth  noting  that  the  writings  of  Edward  IV's 
reign  were  almost  without  exception  in  prose,  —  and  of  that 
prose  Sir  Thomas  Malory  became  by  long  practice  the  prin- 
cipal master:  it  attained  its  highest  relative  beauty  in  his 
Morte  d'Arthur.  Rhymed  romances,  however,  were  still  so 
popular  as  to  warrant  the  production  of  new  ones;  as  an 


178  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

example  of  these  and  not  from  any  inherent  merit,  —  as  an 
illustration  also  of  the  witchery  of  Geoffrey  of  Monmouth's 
legends,  potent  enough  to  convert  many  a  fugitive  tale  into  a 
satellite  of  the  Arthurian  system,  —  we  may  give  an  idea  of 
"  Sir  Launfal,"  a  version  of  a  French  original  made  by  an  other- 
wise unknown  rhymer  named  Thomas  Chester.  Launfal  was 
one  of  Arthur's  knights.  He  disapproved  of  the  king's  mar- 
riage with  the  Irish  princess  Guinever;  and  at  the  wedding 
feast  she  marked  her  displeasure  by  bestowing  gifts  on  all  but 
him.  He  forsook  the  court  forthwith  and  haunted  the  woods 
about  Caerleon,  until  one  day  two  lovely  damsels  came  on 
him  in  his  poverty  and  conducted  him  to  the  splendid  pavilion 
of  their  mistress,  the  Lady  Tryamour.  She  showed  him 
peculiar  favor,  gave  him  a  magic  purse  in  which  whenever  he 
put  his  hand  he  should  find  a  piece  of  gold,  gave  beside  a 
charm  against  the  dangers  of  the  tourney,  a  steed  named 
Blanchard,  and  a  page  to  wait  on  him,  — enjoining  him  at  the 
same  time  never  to  speak  of  her  in  the  presence  of  others. 
Thus  equipped  and  attended  he  returned  to  Caerleon  where  he 
lived  right  royally  for  a  while  and  was  victorious  in  many  jousts. 
His  fame  flew  afar,  and  Sir  Valentine,  the  champion  of  Lom- 
bardy,  sent  him  a  challenge.  Launfal  journeyed  thither, 
defeated  the  haughty  hero,  killing  him  in  the  conflict,  then 
slew  his  would-be  avengers  and  returned  to  Arthur's  capital  in 
a  blaze  of  glory.  Guinever  now  made  advances  to  him  which 
he  rejected  scornfully  and  in  his  indignation  forgot  the  due 
government  of  his  tongue,  declaring  that  his  lady's  ugliest 
maid  was  as  fit  to  be  queen  as  she.  The  furious  woman  went 
straight  to  the  king  and  reported  his  insolence,  adding  a  foul 
slander  thereto.  Meantime  Sir  Launfal  feeling  in  his  purse 
found  no  gold,  saw  his  page  spurring  away  on  Blanchard,  and 
bitterly  repented  his  disobedience  to  his  mistress's  command. 
Summoned  to  Arthur's  presence  and  bidden  to  produce  his 
incomparable  mistress  he  was  in  a  desperate  strait  —  when  on 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  179 

a  sudden  ten  beautiful  maidens  appeared,  each  fairer  than  the 
queen,  and  after  them  the  dazzling  Tryamour.  She  cleared 
the  happy  knight  from  Guinever's  calumny  and  breathing  on 
that  wicked  woman  turned  her  blind ;  then  rode  away  with  her 
lover  and  her  maids  to  the  magic  isle  of  Oleron.  "Thus  was 
Sir  Launfal  borne  away  to  faery  and  never  seen  more  by 
mortal  men." 

The  spell  of  Arthurian  legend  and  the  Sancgreal  was  laid 
with  fresh  power  upon  the  England  of  Caxton's  day.  It  is  a 
significant  fact  that  in  Wales  there  had  been  in  progress  for 
fully  a  century  a  revival  of  song  largely  connected  with  Glen- 
dower's  war  of  independence.  Some  time  in  the  reign  of 
Henry  VI  a  voluminous  and  singularly  dull  rhymed  version  of 
the  familiar  story  had  been  produced,  destined  speedily  to  be 
effaced,  together  with  all  previous  versions,  by  Sir  Thomas 
Malory's  rendering,  completed,  as  he  tells  us,  in  the  ninth  year 
of  the  reign  of  King  Edward  IV  —  that  is,  in  1469  or  the 
winter  of  1470.  Though  in  prose  this  work,  unlike  the  poem 
just  mentioned,  is  anything  but  prosaic;  it  is  in  fact  a  prose- 
epic  ;  into  that  mould  was  poured  the  aspiration  of  an  age  that 
would  otherwise  have  found  vent  in  poetry.  Malory  caught 
the  naive  narrative  manner  and  poetic  charm  of  his  French 
originals  ;  his  concluding  book  especially  —  the  Morte  d' Arthur 
proper  —  has  in  both  style  and  subject  the  true  epic  cadence. 
And  so  it  came  to  pass  that  an  enchanted  wind  of  high  and 
chivalric  romance  blew  through  those  money-getting  days  of 
Edward  IV,  and  the  mystic  light  of  the  Grail  silvered  them, 
touching  with  exquisite  refinement  and  spirituality  an  age  in 
which  the  body  was  re-asserting  itself  imperiously  and  the 
senses  were  grossly  indulged,  —  but  that  glamour  could  stir 
strange  yearnings  even  in  the  sensual  breast.  And  the  old 
knight's  prose-epic  has  remained  one  of  the  chief  legacies  that 
the  Middle  Ages  have  bequeathed  to  after-times:  its  theme 
universally  known,  itself  more  widely  read  and  loved  in  the 


180  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

land  of  its  birth  than  any  other  composition  of  those  periods. 
It  has  been  a  great  poetic  factor,  richly  nourishing  the 
imagination,  awakening  perennially  the  sense  of  wonder. 

Those  tales  of  the  Round  Table  are  the  doubly  distilled 
essence  of  the  four  centuries  during  which  they  were  in  process 
of  elaboration ;  they  are  a  compend  of  the  ages  of  chivalry, 
feudalism,  and  Latin  Catholicism,  —  the  embodiment  of  what 
we  call  the  mediaeval  spirit,  its  sensuality  and  asceticism,  its 
ferocity  and  loyalty,  its  superstition  and  spirituality.  Their 
real  hero,  Sir  Launcelot  du  Lake,  is  its  consummate  type,  — 
and  second  only  to  him  comes  Sir  Tristram  de  Lyoness.  These 
rival  champions  form,  with  Arthur  and  Guinevere,  Mark  and 
Isoud  respectively,  two  triads  of  souls  deeply  sinned  against 
and  sinning,  in  each  triad  an  imperfect  marriage,  a  love  per- 
fect and  passionate  yet  guilty  when  it  might  have  been  holy,  — 
such  is  the  simple  and  tragic  motive  of  the  double  action  in  this 
vast  aggregation  of  romances.  It  may  not  be  called  immoral 
for  not  the  representation  but  the  justification  of  immorality  is 
immoral  and  that  is  not  suggested  here.  Upon  the  treat- 
ment of  the  theme  our  judgment  must  be  based  and  then  the 
tales  of  Tristram  and  Launcelot  will  be  acquitted  of  any  solici- 
tation to  illicit  love  ;  a  heavy  sense  of  a  law  broken  weighs 
upon  the  spirit  of  the  actors,  and  in  the  suffering,  penitence, 
and  agony  of  the  guilty  ones,  even  to  the  rending  asunder  of 
soul  and  body,  poetic  justice  is  duly  meted  out.  Many  episodes 
in  the  working  out  of  the  plot  cannot  be  thus  acquitted  save  as 
they  are  truthful  reflections  of  a  moral  lawlessness  rife  in 
those  times,  largely  consequent  upon  enforced  and  unhappy 
marriages  unworthy  of  the  name.  Beside,  a  frank  submission 
to  the  demands  of  the  senses  was  undoubtedly  a  latent  charac- 
teristic of  the  Middle  Ages,  often  erroneously  supposed  to  be 
peculiar  to  the  Renascence,  —  a  fact  that  should  be  sufficient 
warning  to  those  who  seek  to  make  rigid  separation  between 
those  periods,  ruling  any  touch  of  Renascent  life  out  of  its 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE  181 

legitimate  connection  with  mediaeval  history.  The  most  vehe- 
ment expression  of  this  riot  in  the  blood  is  an  incident  in  Tris- 
tram's career,  when  a  fresh  wound,  bleeding  freely,  cannot 
assuage  his  raging  lust. 

The  ferocity,  the  lust  of  fighting  of  those  knightly  ages  is 
expressed  in  what  are  perhaps  the  most  tedious  passages  in 
the  volume  —  descriptions  of  battles  in  which  knights  "  hurtle 
like  wild  boars,"  one  smiting  down  one  and  another  another 
in  wearisome  repetition  until  the  ground  is  covered  with 
blood. 

A  propensity  to  magic  runs  through  the  whole  romance  as 
was  inevitable  in  an  age  that  practised  it  and  explained  every- 
thing beyond  common  experience  as  the  result  of  magical  influ- 
ence. The  prominent  parts  played  by  the  wizard  Merlin  and 
Arthur's  witch-sister,  Morgan  le  Fay,  come  instantly  to  mind  : 
in  a  highly  imaginative  passage  the  Fay,  being  pursued  and 
nearly  overtaken,  turns  herself  and  her  steed  into  a  great 
marble  stone.  Other  enchantresses  are  Dame  Brisen  and  the 
Lady  of  the  Lake.  The  diabolical  mantle  that  the  unnatural 
Fay  sends  her  brother  the  king,  his  sword  Excalibur  and  other 
enchanted  or  fated  brands,  suggest  a  strain  of  Saracenic  magic 
imported  at  the  time  of  the  Crusades.  Violent  love  and  hatred 
are  the  result  of  witchcraft,  as  in  the  case  of  Sir  Pelleas  and 
the  lady  Ettarde,  practised  upon  by  the  sorceress  of  the  lake; 
a  classic  example  is  the  philtre  shared  by  Tristram  and  Isoud, 
"  whose  love  never  departed  after  for  weal  or  woe."  Works 
of  art  are  a  product  of  subtle  craft,  as  the  twelve  gilded  statues 
of  kings  that  Merlin  made  with  the  figure  of  King  Arthur 
above  them  all,  his  drawn  sword  in  his  hand.  The  sovereign 
enchantment  is  that  of  the  blessed  Grail,  which  heals  deep 
wounds,  dispels  madness,  and  spreads  the  board  with  delicate 
viands. 

The  landscape  through  which  the  knights  course  on  their 
quest  is  solemn,  grand,  and  vague,  as  befits  the  breadth  and 


182  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

mystery  of  the  action;  there  are  no  touches  of  minute  observa- 
tion, but  the  large,  primitive  elements  of  natural  scenery  are 
ever  present  —  mountain  and  valley,  lake  and  river,  wood  and 
sea ;  almost  always  an  old  chapel,  abbey,  or  castle  may  some- 
where be  discerned,  and  the  May  sun  or  the  moonlight  of 
romance  irradiates  the  scene. 

Of  the  crowning  glory  of  nature  —  the  human  form  —  a  fine 
appreciation  is  displayed  that  only  needed  a  little  quickening 
to  turn  into  the  passionate  admiration  felt  by  the  artists  of 
the  Italian  Renascence.  Thus  Sir  Galahad's  beauty  moved  all 
who  saw  him  (and  whoever  would  behold  his  semblance,  an 
ideal  knight  "without  villany  or  treachery,"  may  go  to  Florence 
and  in  the  St.  George  of  Donatello  see  it  immortalized  in  stone). 
A  unique  touch  occurs  in  the  romance  of  Tristram,  where  the 
king,  riding  in  the  forest,  discovers  a  "  fair  naked  man  "  sleep- 
ing by  a  spring,  his  sword  lying  on  the  grass  beside  him,  —  it 
is  his  nephew,  Sir  Tristram,  who  has  gone  distracted  through 
suspicion  that  Isoud  is  deceiving  him.  The  suggestion  of 
shining  water,  the  gleam  of  steel  on  the  soft  green  grass,  the 
tint  of  flesh,  and  the  figure  of  the  king  on  horseback,  pushing 
through  the  boughs  of  the  forest,  —  these  few  simple  elements 
make  up  a  picture  of  rare  beauty.  Enjoying  this  perception 
of  the  beauty  of  the  nude  male  form  —  without  which  the 
highest  art  can  never  be — it  is  somewhat  remarkable  that  that 
generation  gave  birth  to  no  fine  painting  or  sculpture;  the 
absence  of  these  indicates  a  conspicuous  defect  in  the  English 
genius.  The  final  gorgeous  efflorescence  of  English  Gothic 
architecture  was  indeed  then  preparing  :  in  this  the  artistic 
impulse  of  the  time  found  satisfaction.  It  was  certainly  nour- 
ished by  Malory's  narrative,  which  constantly  blossoms  out  into 
passages  of  high  pictorial  value  that  make  it  in  truth  a  mine  for 
artists. 

A  few  extracts  will  help  to  illustrate  what  has  been  said  and 
will  afford  a  taste  of  the  enchantment  of  the  tale. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  183 

"  So  they  rode  till  they  came  to  a  lake  the  which  was  a  fair  water 
and  broad.  And  in  the  midst  of  the  lake  Arthur  was  ware  of  an  arm 
clothed  in  white  samite  that  held  a  fair  sword  in  the  hand.  '  Lo,' 
said  Merlin,  '  yonder  is  the  sword  that  I  spake  of.'  With  that  they 
saw  a  damsel  going  upon  the  lake.  '  What  damsel  is  that  ?  '  said  the 
king.  '  That  is  the  Lady  of  the  Lake,'  said  Merlin,  '  and  within  that 
lake  is  a  rock  and  therein  is  as  fair  a  place  as  any  on  earth  and  richly 
beseen;  and  this  damsel  will  come  to  you  anon  and  then  speak  ye 
fair  to  her  that  she  will  give  you  that  sword.'  "... 

"Right  so  there  came  by  the  holy  vessel  of  the  Sancgreal  with  all 
manner  of  sweetness  and  savor  but  they  could  not  readily  see 
who  bare  that  vessel.  But  Sir  Percivale  had  a  glimmering  of  the 
vessel  and  of  the  maiden  that  bare  it,  for  he  was  a  perfect  clean 
maiden.  And  forthwithal  they  both  were  as  whole  of  hide  and  limb 
as  ever  they  were  in  their  life  days."  .  .  . 

"  And  then  the  king  and  all  estates  went  home  unto  Camelot  and  so 
went  to  evensong  to  the  great  minster,  and  after  that  to  supper,  and 
every  knight  sat  in  his  own  place  as  they  were  toforehand.  Then  anon 
they  heard  cracking  and  crying  of  thunder  that  hem  thought  the  place 
should  all  to  drive.  In  the  midst  of  this  blast  entered  a  sunbeam 
more  clearer  by  seven  times  than  ever  they  saw  day  and  all  they  were 
alighted  by  the  grace  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  Then  began  every  knight 
to  behold  other  and  either  saw  other  by  their  seeming  fairer  than 
ever  they  saw  afore.  Not  for  then  there  was  no  knight  might  speak 
one  word  a  great  while  and  so  they  looked  every  man  on  another 
as  they  had  been  dumb.  Then  there  entered  into  the  hall  the  Holy 
Grail  covered  with  white  samite,  but  there  was  none  might  see  it 
nor  who  bare  it ;  and  there  was  all  the  hall  fulfilled  with  good  odors 
and  every  knight  had  such  meats  and  drinks  as  he  best  loved  in  this 
world.  And  when  the  Holy  Grail  had  been  borne  through  the  hall 
then  the  holy  vessel  departed  suddenly  that  they  wist  not  where 
it  became.  Then  had  they  all  breath  to  speak  and  then  the  king 
yielded  thankings  to  God  of  his  good  grace  that  he  had  sent  them. 
'  Certes,'  said  the  king,  'we  ought  to  thank  our  Lord  Jesu  greatly  for 
that  he  hath  showed  us  this  day  at  the  reverence  of  this  high  feast  of 
Pentecost.'"  .  .  . 

"  And  at  the  last  he  came  to  a  stony  cross  which  departed  two 


184  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

ways  in  waste  land  ;  and  by  the  cross  was  a  stone  that  was  of  marble 
but  it  was  so  dark  that  Sir  Launcelot  might  not  weet  what  it  was.  Then 
Sir  Launcelot  looked  by  him  and  saw  an  old  chapel  and  there  he 
weened  to  have  found  people.  And  Sir  Launcelot  tied  his  horse  to  a 
tree  and  there  he  did  off  his  shield  and  hung  it  upon  a  tree  and  then 
went  to  the  chapel  door  and  found  it  waste  and  broken.  And  within 
he  found  a  fair  altar  full  richly  arrayed  with  cloth  of  clean  silk  and  there 
stood  a  fair  candlestick  which  bare  six  great  candles,  and  the  candle- 
stick was  of  silver.  And  when  Sir  Launcelot  saw  this  light  he  had 
great  will  for  to  enter  into  the  chapel  but  he  could  find  no  place  where 
he  might  enter  ;  then  was  he  passing  heavy  and  dismayed.  Then  he 
returned  and  came  to  his  horse  and  did  off  his  saddle  and  bridle  and 
let  him  pasture  ;  and  unlaced  his  helm  and  ungirded  his  sword  and 
laid  him  down  to  sleep  upon  his  shield  before  the  cross."  .  .  . 

" '  But  my  time  hieth  fast,'  said  the  king  unto  Sir  Bedivere  ;  '  take 
thou  Excalibur  my  good  sword  and  go  with  it  to  yonder  water  side 
and  when  thou  comest  there  I  charge  thee  throw  my  sword  in  that 
water'  ...  So  Sir  Bedivere  departed  and  by  the  way  he  beheld  that 
noble  sword  that  the  pommel  and  the  haft  was  all  of  precious  stones 
and  then  he  said  to  himself,  'if  I  throw  this  rich  sword  in  the  water 
thereof  shall  never  come  good  but  harm  and  loss.'  And  then  Sir 
Bedivere  hid  Excalibur  under  a  tree  ;  and  as  soon  as  he  might  he 
came  again  unto  the  king  and  said  he  had  been  at  the  water  and  had 
thrown  the  sword  in.  'What  saw  thou  there?'  said  the  king  ... 
'Sir'  he  said,  'I  saw  nothing  but  the  waters  wap  and  waves  wan.' 
'  Ah,  traitor  untrue  ! '  said  King  Arthur :  '  But  now  go  again  lightly 
for  thy  long  tarrying  putteth  me  in  great  jeopardy  of  my  life.  For  I 
have  taken  cold,  and  but  if  thou  do  now  as  I  bid  thee  if  ever  I  may 
see  thee  I  shall  slay  thee  with  mine  own  hands,  for  thou  wouldest  for 
my  rich  sword  see  me  dead.'  Then  Sir  Bedivere  departed  and  went 
to  the  sword  and  lightly  took  it  up  and  went  to  the  water  side  ;  and 
there  he  bound  the  girdle  about  the  hilts  and  then  he  threw  the 
sword  as  far  into  the  water  as  he  might,  and  there  came  an  arm  and 
a  hand  above  the  water  and  met  it  and  caught  it  and  so  shook  it 
thrice  and  brandished,  and  then  vanished  away  the  hand  with  the 
sword  in  the  water.  So  Sir  Bedivere  came  again  to  the  king  and 
told  him  what  he  saw.  '  Alas '  said  the  king,  '  help  me  hence  for  I 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE. 

^ 


dread  me  I  have  tarried  over  long/  Then  Sir  Bedivere  took  the  king 
upon  his  back  and  so  went  with  him  to  that  water  side  ;  and  fast  by 
the  bank  hovered  a  little  barge  with  many  fair  ladies  in  it,  and  among 
them  all  was  a  queen,  and  all  they  had  black  hoods,  and  they  wept 
and  shrieked  when  they  saw  King  Arthur. 

'  Now  put  me  in  the  barge,'  said  the  king,  and  so  he  did  softly. 
And  there  received  him  three  queens  with  great  mourning  and  so 
they  set  him  down,  and  in  one  of  their  laps  King  Arthur  laid  his 
head  ;  and  then  that  queen  said,  «  Ah,  dear  brother,  why  have  ye 
tarried  so  long  ?  '  And  so  then  they  rowed  from  the  land.  Then  Sir 
Bedivere  cried,  «  Ah,  my  lord  Arthur,  what  shall  become  of  me  now 
ye  go  from  me  and  leave  me  here  alone  among  mine  enemies  ?  ' 
1  Comfort  thyself  '  said  the  king,  '  and  do  as  well  as  thou  mayest  for 
in  me  is  no  trust  for  to  trust  in.  For  I  will  into  the  vale  of  Avilion 
to  heal  me  of  my  grievous  wound.'  " 

With  such  dirgelike  music  the  Morte  d'  Arthur  draws  to  its 
close,  and  not  there  only,  but  through  the  whole  complex  of 
romances  as  well  may  be  heard  a  like  asolian  strain,  swelling 
and  dying  away  and  rising  again  with  the  wind  of  inspiration. 

For  poetry  of  form  as  well  as  substance  we  must  cross  the 
northern  border,  for  such  was  produced  in  this  era  by  one  man 
only  in  Britain  and  he  a  subject  of  James  III.  Robert  Henry- 
son,  schoolmaster  at  Dunfermline,  in  his  bright  and  picturesque 
Scotch  verse  both  openly  confesses  and  unconsciously  reveals 
the  sway  that  Chaucer's  genius  exerted  over  him  ;  he  was 
though  no  servile  follower:  he  linked  his  work  to  the  master's 
by  writing  a  "  Testament  of  Cresseid,"  intended  as  a  supple- 
ment to  Chaucer's  "  Troylus,"  but  in  the  act  gave  evidence  of 
his  independence  of  spirit,  for  in  his  sequel  he  proposed  to 
correct  what  he  deemed  amiss  in  the  moral  of  his  original  by 
inflicting  upon  Cressida  a  fit  punishment  for  her  faithlessness. 
His  "  Robyne  and  Makyne,"  a  comic  pastoral,  is  the  first  of  its 
class  in  British  poetry.  Makyne,  a  lovelorn  country  lass,  has 
long  teased  with  her  affection  the  insensible  Robyne  ;  just  as 
she,  weary  of  his  hardness  of  heart,  is  beginning  to  catch  his 


186  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

spirit  of  indifference  he  begins  to  relent  and  erelong  grows 
ardent — but  she  is  now  heart-whole  and  cold;  the  moral  is, 
"  He  that  will  not  when  he  may,  when  he  will  shall  have  a  nay." 
But  it  is  by  his  clever  fables,  thirteen  in  number,  that  Henryson 
is  best  remembered  ;  the  demand  for  such  reading  was  general 
in  his  day,  —  Caxton  printed  a  version  of  the  fables  of  ^Esop. 
Two  of  Henryson's  — "The  Dog,  Sheep,  and  Wolf,"  and  "  The 
Wolf  and  Lamb  "  —  are  palpable  hits  at  the  rich  and  powerful 
for  their  oppression  of  the  poor  people,  the  commons.  For  his 
"  Chaunticleir  and  Fox  "  Henryson  was  indebted  to  the  Can- 
terbury Tale  told  by  the  nun's  priest.  His  beautiful  prologue 
to  the  fable  of  the  Lion  and  Mouse  is  an  excellent  example  of 
his  descriptive  powers  :  his  delicate  observation  of  nature  sup- 
plies a  notorious  want  in  contemporary  English  literature,  — 
indeed,  he  is  often  startlingly  modern  in  his  sensitiveness  to 
external  impressions. 

During  the  reign  of  James  III  a  prolix  narrative  poem  on 
the  national  hero,  William  Wallace,  was  produced  by  a  Scottish 
minstrel  popularly  known  as  Blind  Harry.  This  effort  was 
suggested,  doubtless,  by  the  success  achieved  by  Barbour's 
"  Bruce,"  -  —  to  which  it  serves  as  an  introduction.  It  is 
inspired  by  a  bitter  hatred  of  the  English. 

In  the  time  of  Edward  IV,  apparently,  the  old  mystery-plays 
were  matured  into  the  form  in  which  we  now  possess  them. 
Among  the  Wakefield  or  Towneley  mysteries  are  two  lively 
pictures  of  rustic  manners  —  the  "  Cain,"  and  the  Second  Play 
of  the  Shepherds.  Cain  is  naively  represented  as  an  English 
boor  of  the  fifteenth  century;  he  is  a  burly  brute,  lustful, 
greedy,  irascible,  envious  —  an  incarnation  of  all  the  deadly 
sins:  a  full-blooded  "Iniquity"  as  compared  with  that  old 
abstraction,  the  Vice  of  the  moral  plays. 

Chaucer's  canon's  yeoman's  tale  may  be  read  as  an  intro- 
duction to  this  age  which  was  infected  fully  as  much  as  his 
with  a  rage  for  alchemical  pursuits.  To  the  first  half  of 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  187 

Edward's  reign  belongs  an  imposture  called  "  The  Book  of 
Quint- Essence  "  —  a  panegyric  on  that  purest  of  substances, 
the  "  Water  of  Life,"  incorruptible,  and  imparting  incorrupti- 
bility, able  to  restore  old  feeble  men  to  the  strength  of  youth : 
a  walnut-shell  full  of  it  is  a  panacea  for  every  ill.  To  make  it, 
"  distil  one  thousand  times,"  etc.,  etc.  George  Ripley,  a 
Carmelite  friar,  was  a  celebrated  alchemist ;  he  dedicated  his 
rhymed  "  Compound  of  Alchemy  "  to  the  king.  Incited  by  his 
success,  another  of  these  philosophers  named  Thomas  Norton 
produced  an  "Ordinal  of  the  Chemical  Art,"  also  in  verse, 
which  he  presented  in  1477  to  Archbishop  Neville,  his  patron 

—  brother  to  the  fallen  Warwick.     Roger  Bacon  was  Norton's 
paragon,  —  a  fact  that  we   may  record  as   one  among  many 
indications  of  a  certain  sympathy  between  this  age  and  that  of 
Edward  I. 

A  cursory  view  of  the  condition  of  the  mainland  of  Europe 
at  the  end  of  the  century  reveals  an  extraordinary  development 
of  the  principle  of  centralized  government  so  forcibly  expounded 
by  Louis  XI.  Nowhere  is  this  more  striking  than  in  the 
Spanish  peninsula,  where  political  affairs  had  long  been  in  a 
state  of  distraction  amounting  almost  to  anarchy.  Now,  under 
the  resolute  control  of  Ferdinand  and  Isabella,  the  Hermandad, 
or  league  of  towns  for  mutual  defence,  was  developed  into  an 
effective  police  for  the  whole  kingdom  ;  the  nobility  even  was 
subjected  to  its  jurisdiction;  and  crime  and  disorder  were 
repressed.  Justice  was  everywhere  unflinchingly  administered 
and  a  revision  of  the  Castilian  law-code  was  taken  in  hand. 
Not  less  remarkable  were  the  financial  and  economic  reforms, 

—  by  which  the  state  of  the  coinage  was  improved,  and  the 
royal  revenues  were  largely  augmented,  —  and  the  industrial 
awakening,  extraordinary   for    Spain,    that   ensued   upon   the 
restoration  of  credit :  trade  and  agriculture  revived,  and  the 
roads  —  now  freed  from  robbers  —  were  put  in  better  condition. 

A  step  symbolical  of  the  changed  relations  of  the  feudal 


188  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

aristocracy  and  the  new  monarchy  was  taken  in  the  year  1476, 
when  at  the  death  of  Rodrigo  Manrique,  grandmaster  of  the 
famous  order  of  Knights  of  Santiago,  Ferdinand  assumed  the 
headship.  The  incorporation  of  the  masterships  of  the  other 
military  orders  with  the  crown  followed  in  due  course  and  was 
erelong  made  perpetual  by  a  papal  provision. 

Manrique's  death  was  the  occasion  of  one  of  the  noblest 
poems  in  Spanish  literature  —  the  sonorous  "Coplas  "  or  stanzas 
of  his  son  Don  Jorge,  a  young  hero  who  died  on  the  field  of 
battle  three  years  later.  Beginning  with  some  solemn  reflections 
on  death's  universal  empire  over  the  race,  the  relentless  sweep 
of  time,  and  the  transiency  of  this  world's  pleasure  and  glory, 
the  monody  passes  to  a  few  particular  instances  of  the  power 
of  death  and  change  drawn,  in  a  manner  that  reminds  us  of 
one  of  Villon's  ballads,  from  recent  Spanish  history,  and  con- 
cludes with  a.  tribute  of  filial  love  and  pride  to  the  memory 
of  Don  Rodrigo,  a  typical  Castilian  cavalier,  brave  and  devout. 
Solemn  as  the  poem  is  it  is  yet  nowhere  gloomy  for  it  is 
relieved  by  a  perfect  faith  in  a  brighter  and  an  enduring 
world. 

In  1492  the  protracted  war  of  conquest  waged  against  the 
Moors  of  Granada  to  which  Spanish  zeal  gave  the  character  of 
a  last  Crusade  and  which  afforded  an  opportunity  for  a  final 
glorious  display  of  mediaeval  chivalry  was  brought  to  a 
conclusion  and  made  amends  in  some  measure  for  the  losses 
that  Christendom  had  lately  sustained  at  the  other  end  of  the 
Mediterranean.  Later  in  the  same  year  the  discoveries  of 
Columbus  gave  to  Castile  and  Leon  a  new  world. 

At  this  period  the  dramatic  pieces  of  Juan  de  la  Enzina 
were  being  performed,  —  an  edition  of  them  was  published  in 
1496.  They  are  remarkable  for  the  light  they  throw  upon  the 
process  of  transition  from  the  ancient  mysteries  to  the  comedy 
of  real  life.  In  1499  was  published  a  clever  play  called 
"  Celestina  "  from  the  tricky  woman  who  is  the  leading  char- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  189 

acter ;  it  was  written  by  a  law-student  at  Salamanca  named 
Rojas. 

Beside  the  creation  of  these  new  forms  in  the  drama  active 
work  was  done  in  translating  popular  romances.  It  is  interest- 
ing to  note  that  about  the  same  time  with  Malory  Spanish 
translators  were  busy  with  French  versions  of  Arthurian  fiction  : 
a  Spanish  "  Merlin  "  and  "  Artus "  appeared  in  print  at  the 
turn  of  the  century.  Then,  too,  was  completed  a  translation 
of  the  Portuguese  fiction,  "  Amadis  of  Gaul,"  and  bulky  as  it 
was  it  proved  so  fascinating  that  numberless  additions  were 
grafted  upon  it. 

Feudalism  was  annihilated  in  Portugal  and  the  monarchy 
made  absolute  by  John  II,  who  reigned  from  1481  to  1495. 
Louis  XI  was  his  model.  Like  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  he 
made  use  of  the  representatives  of  the  people  in  his  contest 
with  the  feudal  nobility  and  when  his  end  was  gained  calmly 
dispensed  with  their  services  and  stood  alone  and  supreme. 
The  first  year  of  his  reign  he  struck  severe  blows  at  the  power 
of  the  great  nobles  by  setting  on  foot  an  inquiry  into  their 
titles  to  their  estates  and  by  ordering  the  suppression  of  their 
courts  of  justice.  The  duke  of  Braganza,  the  proudest  of 
them  all,  —  for  nearly  a  third  part  of  Portugal  was  in  his  fee, 
—  led  the  way  in  opposing  these  measures  :  he  was  summarily 
arrested,  tried,  and  put  to  death  in  the  year  1483.  A  relative 
of  his,  the  duke  of  Viseu,  stepped  into  his  place,  —  and  was 
stabbed  to  the  heart  by  the  king's  own  hand  the  year  following ; 
a  hecatomb  of  his  confederates  was  then  sacrificed  and  the 
ruthless  work  was  done.  The  king  could  now  turn  his  atten- 
tion to  cannon-founding,  ship-building  and  the  progress  of  his 
mariners  along  the  African  coast,  and  to  the  encouragement  of 
the  study  of  classic  literature. 

The  policy  of  Louis  XI  was  carried  to  its  triumphant  con- 
summation when  Brittany,  the  last  feudal  area  in  France,  was 
annexed  to  the  crown  by  the  marriage  of  his  son  Charles  VIII 


190  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

to  its  Duchess  Anne  in  the  year  1491.  The  French  power 
thus  consolidated  was  now  the  most  formidable  in  Europe,  but 
a  rival  speedily  appeared  in  Spain,  aggrandized  by  the  conquest 
of  Granada  :  the  two  powerful  states  began  to  try  conclusions 
with  each  other  and  the  theatre  of  war  was  hapless,  divided 
Italy.  Imperial  prerogatives  were  endangered  by  French 
aggression  there  and  Maximilian  of  Austria,  emperor-elect, 
was  hence  involved  in  the  struggle.  At  the  same  time  united 
England  under  the  strong  government  of  her  Tudor  kings  was 
ready  to  begin  her  role  in  the  new  political  system  of  Europe. 
A  novel  aspect  was  thus  given  to  the  face  of  Christendom: 
the  great  powers,  united  within,  began  to  direct  their  energies 
outward,  came  into  manifold  relations  with  each  other,  formed 
league  after  league,  now  for  the  partition  of  Italy,  now  to 
counterpoise  an  overgrown  and  threatening  power :  the  history 
of  the  next  twenty-five  years  is  one  of  incessant,  confusing, 
kaleidoscopic  changes. 

In  1494  the  ambitious  young  king  Charles  VIII,  his  head 
full  of  fantastic  ideas  of  conquest,  descended  upon  Italy  to 
enforce  his  claim  to  the  sovereignty  of  Naples.  His  course 
was  like  a  triumphal  progress  and  excited  such  apprehensions 
that  Milan,  Venice  and  the  pope,  Spain  and  Austria  formed  a 
confederacy  to  cut  off  his  retreat.  Charles  had  to  leave  Naples 
in  haste  and  fight  a  battle  against  great  odds  in  order  to  save 
himself ;  his  conquest  was  transient  but  the  impression  it  made 
sufficiently  long-lasting ;  one  consequence  of  it  was  that  the 
French  carried  home  with  them  fruit  of  the  Renascence. 

In  1496  took  place  a  profoundly  important  union,  the  com- 
plement of  the  famous  marriages  formerly  noticed,  that  of 
Philip,  son  of  Maximilian  and  Mary  of  Burgundy,  and  Joanna, 
daughter,  and  eventually  heiress,  of  Ferdinand  and  Isabella. 
In  the  last  year  of  the  century  there  was  born  to  the  young 
pair  a  son  upon  whose  head  were  to  be  heaped  coronets  and 
crowns. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  191 

At  this  epoch  Louis  XII,  who  had  just  succeeded  his  young 
cousin  Charles  upon  the  throne  of  France,  bringing  to  it  a 
decidedly  questionable  claim  to  the  duchy  of  Milan,  made  an 
easy  conquest  of  that  rich  province  and  then  entered  into  a 
nefarious  alliance  with  Ferdinand  of  Aragon  for  the  partition  of 
Naples.  The  kingdom  was  speedily  overrun  by  their  armies 
but  in  the  division  of  the  spoils  the  allies  quarreled  ;  the  French 
were  defeated  in  several  desperate  engagements  and  their  forces 
wasted  by  disease  ;  and  at  the  end  of  the  year  1503  the  per- 
fidious Ferdinand  remained  in  sole  possession.  Untaught  by 
this  reverse,  Louis  immediately,  and  it  must  be  said  wantonly, 
projected  with  Maximilian  a  partition  of  the  territories  of  the 
republic  of  Venice.  Thus  was  formed  the  league  of  Cambrai, 
to  which  the  pope  and  the  minor  princes  of  Italy  acceded,  and 
in  a  short  campaign  in  the  spring  of  1509  the  republic  was 
despoiled  of  its  possessions  on  the  mainland.  From  this  sorry 
triumph,  however,  Louis  reaped  no  advantage,  for  the  pope  — 
the  belligerent  Julius  II  —  suddenly  veered  round  and  nego- 
tiated with  Spain,  England,  Venice  and  the  Swiss  the  Holy 
League  for  the  purpose  of  driving  the  French  out  of  Italy  — 
an  end  that  was  soon  successfully  accomplished. 

An  astonishing  figure  dominated  Florence  in  the  last  decade 
of  the  fifteenth  century  —  the  last  and  greatest  of  that  line  of 
preachers  of  repentance  the  origin  of  which  we  have  seen  — 
the  eager  Dominican  friar,  Girolamo  Savonarola ;  an  extraor- 
dinary apparition  like  a  Hebrew  prophet  of  old  rising  in  the 
midst  of  renascent  Italy  to  convict  her  cultured  ones  of  sin  and 
startle  them  to  contrition,  to  cast  a  lurid  light  upon  the  vices  of 
a  great  city,  to  denounce  the  skepticism  and  immorality  that 
were  infecting  the  literature  and  art  of  the  Renascence,  to 
proclaim  the  necessity  of  a  reformation  in  the  church,  and  to 
establish  a  momentary  theocracy  under  which  gay  Florence 
grown  devout  took  Jesus  for  her  king.  In  other  lands  as  well 
eloquent  preachers  arose  to  inculcate  righteousness  and  call  the 


192  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

people  back  to  a  spiritual  religion  —  and  the  attentive  crowds 
that  assembled  to  hear  them  showed  that  they  satisfied  a 
widely  felt  need.  The  Breton-born  Franciscan  brother,  Olivier 
Maillard,  whose  life  overlapped  Savonarola's  by  some  years, 
preached  in  many  parts  of  France  and  in  Flanders,  exhorting 
to  holiness  of  life,  rebuking  the  sins  of  every  class,  sparing  not 
those  in  highest  place  :  his  sermons  lacked  the  intense  glow  of 
the  great  Dominican's  but  he  was  an  earnest  and  persuasive 
preacher  in  the  allegorical  style  then  in  vogue  and  his  exceed- 
ingly direct  and  familiar  address  to  his  congregations,  the 
satirical  touches,  anecdotes,  and  scraps  of  verse  with  which  his 
discourse  was  enlivened,  his  frequent  improprieties  in  matter 
and  manner,  simply  enhanced  his  popularity.  Another  eloquent 
Franciscan,  Michel  Menot,  a  slightly  younger  contemporary  of 
his,  far  outdid  Maillard  in  these  homiletical  extravagances,  — 
examples  of  which  were  afforded  in  German  literature  by  the 
sermons  of  Geiler  of  Strassburg,  in  which  we  find  the  same  true 
piety  and  zeal  to  do  good  with  a  like  quaintness  of  illustration, 
allegory,  amusing  and  satirical  anecdote.  An  instance  of 
Geiler's  appeal  to  the  public  taste  is  the  fact  that  he  drew  texts 
for  a  number  of  sermons  from  Sebastian  Brandt's  "  Ship  of 
Fools  "  —  an  extremely  popular  and  not  ungenial  satire  that 
issued  from  the  press  of  Basel  in  1494. 

Two  versions  of  that  Leviathan  of  fables,  "  Reynard  the 
Fox,"  demand  notice,  one  in  Dutch  prose  —  the  one  that  Cax- 
ton  used,  —  the  other  in  Low  German  verse  based  upon  the 
first.  That  mordant  satire  upon  all  lofty  pretensions,  with  its 
ridicule  of  royal  authority,  personated  by  King  Lion,  its  mock- 
ery of  religious  profession  by  the  Fox's  sanctimony,  manifests 
the  sharp,  quite  disenchanted  vision  of  the  common  folk. 
Denying  with  a  grin  all  that  is  knightly,  romantic,  ideal,  and 
spiritual,  it  is  to  the  Morte  d' Arthur  as  nadir  to  zenith,  —  but 
both  must  be  attentively  perused  by  any  who  would  apprehend 
the  Middle  Ages  in  their  entirety.  The  Morte  d'Arthur  was 


<9/'  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  193 

bandied  back  and  forth  between  England  and  France,  Rey- 
nard, between  the  Netherlands,  France  and  Germany ;  and  it 
may  be  doubted  whether  any  other  two  productions  can  give 
one  as  clear  a  notion  of  the  spirit  of  those  times. 

Of  the  many  German  artists  of  that  day  we  may  mention  one 
of  the  most  eminent,  Peter  Vischer  of  Nuremberg,  because  of 
his  conception  of  King  Arthur  presented  in  bronze  at  Inns- 
bruck. It  is  a  noble  figure  and  the  helmeted  face,  especially 
as  seen  in  profile,  is  severely  beautiful.  Vischer's  work  other- 
wise deserves  our  attention  as  indicative  of  the  transition  from 
Gothic  to  Renascent  art. 

During  the  fifteenth  and  first  quarter  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  while  Denmark  was  exercising  an  hegemony  over  the 
other  Scandinavian  states,  final  transcriptions  of  almost  all  of 
her  old  ballads  were  being  made.  Through  the  veil  of  the 
language  of  this  later  age  it  is  not  difficult  to  see  how  these 
interesting  little  poems  can  be  arranged  in  groups  correspond- 
ing to  the  grand  divisions  of  European  literature  in  the  centu- 
ries we  have  traversed.  Thus  some  of  them  are  based  on 
legends  of  saints  ;  one  remarkable  ballad  pictures  the  soul  of 
a  rich  man  just  dead  as  seated  on  the  body's  breast  bewailing 
and  accusing  it :  others  are  poems  of  tender  sentiment,  the 
supreme  type  of  these  being  the  beautiful  and  pathetic  tale  of 
the  loves  of  Axel  and  Walborg ;  others  again  are  humorous, 
among  them  a  delicious  parody  of  the  turgid  style  of  the 
romances  of  chivalry,  quite  in  the  spirit  of  Chaucer's  Sir 
Thopas  or  Pulci's  Morgante. 

The  fall  of  Richard  III  on  Bosworth  field  in  1485  and  the 
elevation  of  his  rival  to  the  throne  as  Henry  VII  put  an  end 
to  the  Wars  of  the  Roses ;  thereby  was  effected  indeed  a  pro- 
found dynastic  change  but  no  real  revolution.  The  policy  of 
the  new  king  was  a  continuation  of  that  of  Edward  IV  whose 
daughter  he  married.  He  projected  a  war  with  France  and 
got  subsidies  for  it  from  parliament  which,  according  to  a 


194  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

precedent  set  by  Edward,  he  reinforced  by  "benevolences  "  or 
loans  exacted  from  wealthy  subjects  —  and  then  sold  peace  at 
a  high  price  to  the  French  king,  making  heavy  profits  on  all 
sides  by  the  transaction.  He  promoted  commerce,  making 
treaties  with  Florence,  the  Scandinavian  countries  and  Riga. 
He  provided  John  and  Sebastian  Cabot  with  ships  for  their 
voyage  over  the  western  ocean ;  and  in  June,  1497,  they  dis- 
covered the  North  American  continent  in  the  neighborhood  of 
Newfoundland. 

The  key  to  Henry's  character  and  system  of  government  is 
a  simple  one,  —  avarice.  Studying  the  vicissitudes  of  the  past 
generation  he  perceived  that  Henry  VI  was  poor  and  unfor- 
tunate, his  successor  rich  and  fortunate,  —  and  he  inferred  a 
causal  connection  between  those  terms.  So  he  decided  that 
to  ensure  his  dynasty  and  the  nation  against  a  return  of  those 
disorders  the  one  thing  needful  was  money,  and  he  cast  about 
to  accumulate  it  in  a  manner  that  suggests  that  the  task  was 
congenial  to  his  nature.  His  policy  of  repressing  the  great 
lords  chimed  with  it ;  parliament  had  passed  a  statute  reducing 
their  large  retinues  to  safer  limits  and  the  king  was  keen  in 
discovering  through  his  agents  any  breach  of  the  law  and 
inexorable  in  exacting  the  penalty.  Ingenious  instruments  of 
his  rapacity  were  found  in  the  lawyers  Dudley  and  Empson; 
and  no  device  by  which  sums  of  money  could  be  extorted  and 
which  could  bear  a  semblance  of  legality  was  left  untried  by 
them.  These  exactions  were  popularly  represented  by  the 
dilemma  known  as  "  Morton's  fork  "  from  the  king's  minister, 
Cardinal  Morton  :  it  was  said  that  none  could  escape  being 
impaled  upon  one  or  the  other  of  its  horns,  for  if  he  lived 
splendidly  he  was  asked  to  give  the  king  of  his  superfluity,  if 
economically,  to  contribute  of  his  savings.  By  these  various 
artifices,  by  a  pacific  policy  that  traded  upon  the  expectation  of 
war,  by  the  device  of  benevolences,  by  fines  and  forfeitures 
and  by  a  rigid  parsimony,  Henry  managed  to  amass  an  enor- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  195 

mous  treasure  and  to  keep  himself  quite  independent  of  parlia- 
ment. He  is  to  be  reckoned  among  the  astute  sovereigns  of 
that  day. 

The  ridiculous  pretensions  of  Simnel  and  Warbeck  and  the 
measure  of  credit  they  gained  are  curious  examples  of  popular 
credulity,  the  unsettled  state  of  men's  minds  and  the  preva- 
lency  of  plots  and  imposture  in  that  period.  Warbeck's  attempt 
had  at  least  one  substantial  result,  for  under  color  of  repelling 
the  Scottish  king's  invasion  in  his  behalf  Henry  wrung  fresh 
subsidies  from  parliament.  The  utter  failure  of  the  plot 
revealed  beside  to  foreign  powers  how  firmly  the  king  was 
seated  on  his  throne,  and  he  was  now  able  to  negotiate  brilliant 
matches  for  his  children,  of  unforeseen  consequence.  In  1501 
he  married  his  son  Arthur  —  a  name  that  yields  historical  evi- 
dence of  the  power  of  romance  —  to  the  princess  Catherine, 
younger  daughter  of  Ferdinand  and  Isabella.  The  frail  young 
prince  died  in  the  following  spring  but  the  king  provided  a 
substitute  for  him  in  his  'second  son,  Henry,  then  in  his  twelfth 
year,  —  for  otherwise  the  princess  would  have  had  to  return  to 
Spain  and  with  her  her  precious  dowry.  Soon  after  Henry 
gave  his  eldest  daughter  Margaret  in  marriage  to  the  king  of 
Scots,  James  IV,  and  thus  secured  peace  on  his  northern 
frontier. 

We  have  seen  how  exquisitely  the  changing  sentiment  of 
ages  is  registered  in  architecture;  fresh  and  striking  illustra- 
tions of  this  law  now  confront  us.  The  principal  monument  of 
Edward  IV's  time  is  the  beautiful  church  of  St.  Mary  Redcliffe 
at  Bristol  —  one  of  the  finest  churches  in  England  not  a  cathe- 
dral, —  a  peculiarly  attractive  specimen  of  the  perpendicular 
style.  But  the  crowning  artistic  glory  of  Henry  VII's  reign 
and  of  the  age  is  the  vaulting  known  as  fan-tracery,  superbly 
exhibited  in  the  three  royal  chapels  of  Windsor,  Cambridge, 
and  Westminster.  In  the  system  of  fan-vaulting  each  section 
is  in  idea  a  half  of  a  spreading  cone  up  the  surface  of  which 


196  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

splay  numerous  ribs  all  of  the  same  length  and  same  curve,  like 
the  fingers  of  a  bent  fan.  The  concave-sided  lozenges  left  in 
the  roof  between  the  crowns  of  the  vaulting  segments  are  filled 
with  elaborate  tracery  or  droop  in  pendants.  The  effect  of  the 
whole,  especially  as  seen  in  St.  George's  chapel,  Windsor,  is 
rich,  elegant  and  buoyant.  The  inception  of  the  new  style 
has  been  thought  to  belong  to  the  last  years  of  Edward's  reign  ; 
thus  the  Divinity  school  at  Oxford  is  referred  to  the  year  1480 
—  but  it  is  roofed  in  the  manner  of  the  next  century.  Both 
St.  George's  chapel  and  that  of  King's  college,  Cambridge, 
were  begun  by  1479;  ^  was  ^e^  f°r  Henry  VII  and  his  son 
to  finish  them;  and  so  we  have  an  architectural  parallel  to 
what  was  said  above  regarding  Henry's  policy :  he  built  upon 
the  foundations  Edward  laid.  The  nave  of  St.  George's  was 
vaulted  in  1490,  its  choir  in  1507.  A  pleasing  specimen  of  the 
style  is  the  "new  building"  at  the  eastern  extremity  of  Peter- 
borough minster,  begun  as  a  receptacle  for  relics  quite  early  in 
the  century  but  not  completed  until"  this  and  the  following 
reign.  Bath  Abbey  is  another  example.  To  the  year  1502 
belongs  the  tiny  chantry  of  the  lamented  Prince  Arthur  at 
Worcester ;  and  then  his  father's  sumptuous  mortuary  chapel  at 
Westminster  was  begun.  Here,  arching  ribs  spring  from  the 
wall  free  for  a  space,  pushing  forward  and  piercing  complete 
and  highly  decorated  cones.  They  resemble  arms  holding 
torches  and  with  the  whirling  flounces  of  tracery,  the  aston- 
ishing pendants  in  the  middle  seeming  to  rest  on  air,  exert  a 
truly  bewildering  effect.  It  is  the  very  flamboyancy  of  vaulting, 
the  dolphin-death  of  Gothic  architecture. 

Considerable  progress  was  made  in  the  revival  of  classical 
learning  during  the  reign  of  Henry  VII.  Thomas  Linacre,  a 
fellow  of  All  Souls',  Oxford,  went  to  Bologna  in  1485  to  per- 
fect himself  in  Greek  as  an  aid  to  advanced  medical  study 
and  putting  by y,  the  mediaeval  versions  of  their  works  read 
Aristotle  and  Galen  in  the  original.  He  visited  Florence 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  197 

(where  he  met  Poliziano),  Rome,  Venice  and  Padua.  William 
Grocyn,  a  fellow  of  New  College,  learned  Greek  of  an  Italian 
resident  at  Oxford;  in  1488  he  went  to  Florence  and  spent 
two  years  in  Italy  studying.  He  was  followed  by  one  Latimer 
in  1489;  and  both  returned  to  Oxford  to  teach  what  they 
had  learned  in  the  favored  haunts  of  classicism. 

John  Colet  was  born  in  London  in  1466.  In  1483  he 
entered  Magdalen  College  ;  there  he  studied  Greek  and  read 
the  works  of  Plato.  After  ten  years  he  visited  Italy  and 
herein  the  wide  difference  between  him  and  the  scholars  just 
mentioned  appears:  they  returned  thence  polished  humanists, 
—  he  returned  with  something  more  than  learning  —  with 
religious  convictions  greatly  deepened  and  a  grave  sense  of 
the  necessity  of  a  reform  in  the  faith  and  morals  of  the  clergy. 

It  has  been  suggested  with  a  large  measure  of  probability 
that  he  owed  to  Savonarola  this  deepening  of  his  religious  con- 
sciousness ;  it  is  certain  that  he  was  in  Florence  during  the 
great  preacher's  supremacy,  —  and  a  soul  like  Colet's  could  not 
fail  to  be  moved  by  that  impassioned  eloquence.  In  1497  we 
find  him  back  at  Oxford  imbued  with  the  teaching  of  St.  Paul, 
delivering  lectures  on  his  epistle  to  the  Romans,  not  in  the 
jejune  style  of  the  scholastic  scribes  with  their  endless  patristic 
references,  but  fresh,  helpful,  rich  in  suggestion,  vibrating  with 
the  note  of  personal  experience.  The  hall  was  crowded  when- 
ever he  lectured ;  it  was  felt  that  a  new  spiritual  force  was 
manifesting  itself  at  the  University. 

A  disciple  and  friend  of  Colet  was  the  young  Thomas  More, 
son  of  a  justice  of  the  court  of  King's  Bench.  He  had  served 
as  a  lad  in  the  household  of  Archbishop  Morton  (afterward 
Cardinal),  and  was  distinguished  even  then  by  his  intelligence 
and  uprightness  of  character.  In  1492,  at  the  age  of  fourteen 
years,  he  was  entered  at  Oxford:  in  1496  at  Lincoln's  Inn.  When 
he  was  about  twenty  years  old  he  underwent  a  severe  religious 
experience  and  sought  peace  through  the  ascetic  discipline 


198  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

still  in  vogue  among  earnest  souls:  he  wore  a  harsh  shirt  of 
hair  next  his  skin,  scourged  himself,  and  slept  on  the  bare 
floor.  While  in  this  mood  he  made  the  acquaintance  of 
Erasmus,  then  on  his  first  visit  to  England,  who,  though 
eleven  years  his  senior,  felt  an  instant  attraction  to  the  young 
Englishman  and  the  two  became  fast  friends.  The  great 
scholar  exerted  a  wholesome  influence,  without  doubt,  upon 
More's  sensitive  nature,  helping  him  gently  out  of  the  thorny 
thicket  of  his  spiritual  anxieties  into  the  flowery  path  of  letters 
again.  Erasmus  moreover  now  ripened  into  intimacy  an 
acquaintance  he  had  formed  with  Colet  upon  the  continent 
some  time  before.  It  is  a  charming  group,  an  intercourse 
delightful  to  think  upon,  that  of  these  three  scholars  and 
sympathetic,  ardent  souls  —  especially  in  an  epoch  otherwise 
singularly  barren  in  literary  attraction.  More  became  the 
fairest  type  of  an  English  humanist.  It  is  a  pity  that  he  and 
Colet  did  not  trust  more  than  they  did  the  capacity  of  expres- 
sion of  their  native  language  :  had  they  done  so  their  fame  — 
and  Colet's  in  particular  —  would  now  be  greatly  enhanced. 

Kay's  successor  as  poet-laureate  royal  was  Bernard  Andre,  a 
scholar  from  the  south  of  France.  About  the  middle  of 
Henry's  reign  he  composed  a  panegyric  in  French  verse, 
"  The  Twelve  Triumphs  of  Henry  the  Seventh,"  in  which  that 
monarch  and  his  brave  exploits  were  compared  with  Hercules 
and  his  labors.  About  that  time,  too,  the  slender  ranks  of 
English  humanists  received  an  accession  in  the  person  of 
Polydore  Vergil,  a  native  of  Urbino,  who,  having  been  de- 
spatched to  England  by  Pope  Alexander  VI  to  levy  Peter's- 
pence  found  his  situation  there  so  agreeable  that  he  decided 
to  remain  and  was  erelong  rewarded  by  preferment  in  the 
church. 

A  native 'scholar  of  considerable  celebrity  was  John  Skelton, 
to  whom,  it  will  be  remembered,  Caxton  looked  up  and  whom 
even  Erasmus  extolled.  According  to  a  custom  of  the  time 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  199 

he  had  received  the  degree  of  poet-laureate  from  the  University 
of  Oxford  for  his  skill  in  Latin  versification.  In  a  rhyme  of 
some  length,  pleasing  in  spots,  entitled  "The  Garland  of 
Laurel,"  and  addressed  to  some  ladies  who  had  worked  a 
wreath,  the  insignia  of  his  rank,  upon  his  court  gown,  he  vin- 
dicates his  title  to  the  poet's  crown,  adducing  a  number  of  his 
poems.  The  king  was  his  patron  :  he  was  appointed  tutor  to 
Prince  Henry  and  had  the  honor  of  producing  a  "  morality," 
since  lost,  before  his  majesty  and  the  court  at  Woodstock. 
When  he  had  reached  middle  age  he  took  orders  and  was 
presented  with  a  living  in  Norfolk;  his  biographers  seem  to 
suppose  that  at  this  time  his  character  underwent  a  sudden 
change  and  that  from  a  scholar  he  became  the  coarsely 
abusive  satirist  that  his  name  now  first  suggests.  But  in  his 
earliest  known  effort,  a  dirge  for  Edward  IV,  we  find  the  moral- 
izing tone,  the  note  of  disenchantment,  of  disgust  with  the  world, 
that  proclaims  the  embryo  satirist;  and  if  we  had  his  poems  in 
chronological  order  they  would  no  doubt  reveal  that  his  temper 
grew  more  savage  as  the  character  of  the  times  became  plainer. 
In  the  piece  just  referred  to  he  quotes  St.  Bernard  to  the  effect 
that  "  a  man  is  but  a  sack  of  stercory  and  shall  return  to  worm's 
meat,"  —and  upon  that  hideous  text  great  part  of  his  produc- 
tion hangs.  Skelton  had  a  morbid  sense  of  the  loathsomeness 
of  physical  decay,  disease  and  death  ;  in  a  repulsive  poem  he 
held  up  a  grinning  death's  head  to  the  age  as  a  picture  of  the 
end  of  all  its  strength  and  splendor.  An  oft-printed  piece  of 
his,  "The  Tunning  of  Elinor  Rumming,"  is  a  superlative 
example  of  nauseous  realism. 

The  testimony  of  Alexander  Barclay,  translator  of  Brandt's 
"  Ship  of  Fools,"  is  that  the  England  of  his  day  was  given  over 
to  "  Lewdness  and  Folly."  Brandt's  famous  satire  had  by  this 
time  been  translated  into  several  languages.  Its  conception 
was  furnished  by  the  chariot  shaped  like  a  ship  and  peopled 
by  droll  figures,  the  "naval  car  "  that  is  believed  to  have  given 


200  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

its  name  to  the  carnival,  at  which  it  used  to  be  a  principal 
show,  being  dragged  along  in  procession.  Brandt  fancied  its 
passengers  and  crew  to  be  representatives  of  over  a  hundred 
classes  of  fools ;  his  motive  was  to  expose  the  myriad  devia- 
tions from  common  sense  that  make  men  ridiculous.  Barclay's 
free  English  version  with  alterations  was  produced  in  1508 
and  printed  the  following  year.  He  explains  that  its  title 
might  have  been  "  The  Satire,  or  Reprehension  of  Foolishness." 
The  book  was  illustrated  with  quaint  German  wood-cuts,  among 
them  two  representations  of  that  antique  machine,  long  a  poetic 
property,  —  the  wheel  of  Fortune.  Amid  the  crowd  of  fools 
we  note  the  bibliophile,  the  superannuated  man  of  fashion,  the 
young  man  who  has  married  an  old  woman  for  her  money,  the 
petulant  woman,  the  fat-witted  person  who  cannot  understand 
a  joke,  the  boaster,  the  gambler,  and  some  choice  specimens 
of  the  fcrol  in  orders  —  the  ignorant  priest,  the  covetous  bishop. 
In  marked  contrast  to  these  specimens  of  satire  indicative, 
whether  coarse  or  dull,  of  some  deep-seated  disorder  in  the 
social  framework  —  a  schism  fast  becoming  too  grave  to  be 
borne  between  what  was  and  what  ought  to  have  been  —  is  the 
placid  rehabilitation  of  mediaeval  ideals  in  Stephen  Hawes' 
"  Pastime  of  Pleasure."  To  an  Oxford  education  Hawes 
added  the  polish  of  travel  in  his  own  country  and  in  France. 
He  was  something  of  a  linguist  and  was  especially  conversant 
with  French.  He  was  a  student  of  literature,  a  critic  even  after 
his  kind :  thus  he  would  draw  comparisons  between  Chaucer 
and  Lydgate,  magnifying  the  excellences  of  the  latter  bard. 
Lydgate  he  adopted  as  his  master,  his  patron  saint  in  letters; 
for  his  memory  he  showed  an  extraordinary  veneration  and 
affection.  In  paying  his  tribute  of  respect  to  the  three  lords  of 
English  song  he  despatches  Chaucer  and  Gower  in  three 
stanzas  while  he  devotes  ten  to  Lydgate.  Here  we  have  the 
unmistakable  sign-manual  of  the  literary  dilettante,  of  one  who 
would  establish  an  esoteric  cult  in  poetry  by  reversing  the 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  201 

popular,  the  vulgar  estimate,  who  seeks  distinction  by  an 
amiable  eccentricity  of  judgment,  an  affectation  of  special 
insight.  Hawes  was  in  fact  the  representative  man  of  letters 
of  the  reign,  the  exponent  of  its  culture;  he  was  its  product, 
for  he  was  yet  young  when  towards  its  close  he  composed  his 
principal  work.  He  was  an  ornament  of  the  court,  being  in 
great  request  for  his  talents  in  composition,  conversation  and 
recitation  from  the  elder  poets  —  for  he  had  a  capacious 
memory.  The  king  made  him  his  Groom  of  the  Chamber. 

"The  Pastime  of  Pleasure"  was  produced  in  1505-1506 
and  printed  in  1509.  Although  the  author,  in  accordance  with 
a  long-standing  fashion,  prays  to  Venus  for  success  in  love 
and  to  Mars  for  the  meed  of  enduring  fame,  and  though  this 
desire  of  fame  is  felt  to  be  a  potent  motive  in  its  composition, 
the  poem  is  yet  essentially  mediaeval  in  general  design  and 
detail.  Its  groundwork  is  that  of  the  romances  of  chivalry :  it 
is  the  quest  of  a  knight,  Grand  Amour,  toward  union  with  the 
feminine  ideal,  La  Belle  Pucelle.  It  is  allegorical  in  intention 
as  these  titles  indicate  and  exceedingly  didactic  —  mediaeval 
characteristics  both.  Its  characters  are  those  of  a  "  morality  " : 
thus  Grand  Amour  in  his  quest  encounters  an  ugly  dwarf, 
False  Report,  slays  the  three-headed  giant  Falsehood,  and  is 
instructed  by  Counsel.  In  its  execution  it  develops  into  a  little 
cyclopaedia  of  mediaeval  culture,  for  the  typical  knight  must 
be  a  master  of  all  the  sciences  :  Grand  Amour  is  bidden  by 
Doctrine  to  perfect  himself  in.  the  studies  of  the  trivium 
—  grammar,  logic,  and  rhetoric,  —  and  of  the  quadrivium,  — - 
arithmetic,  music,  geometry  and  astronomy.  His  course  in 
the  school  of  Rhetoric  occasions  quite  an  interesting  analysis 
of  that  art  as  taught  in  Hawes's  day:  its  parts,  we  learn,  are 
Invention,  Disposition  —  or  arrangement  of  narrative  or  argu- 
ment, Elocution  —  that  is,  choice  of  words,  expression  (well 
exemplified  by  Lydgate  !),  Pronunciation,  and  Memory.  In 
the  tower  of  Music  its  patroness  sits  surrounded  by  a  heap  of 


202  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

instruments  —  tabors,  sackbut,  dulcimers,  rebeck  and  soft 
recorders,  —  and  we  are  treated  to  a  little  essay  on  the  moral 
influence  of  the  art:  it  banishes  evil  thoughts  and  gladdens 
the  heart.  Under  Astronomy  several  sciences  are  included. 
We  are  taught  first  of  all  that  omnipotent  God,  the  "chief 
astronomer,"  has  made  Nature  to  be  his  vice-gerent.  A 
treatise  of  mediaeval  psychology  follows :  the  five  external 
"  wits  "  or  senses  are  five  gates  through  which  information 
streams  in  upon  the  first  of  the  five  internal  senses,  the  "  Com- 
mon wit  "  or  understanding ;  the  other  four  are  Imagination, 
Fantasy  ("  finishing  "  the  matter  afforded  by  the  former),  Esti- 
mation (whose  function  it  is  to  comprehend  space,  time,  cause 
and  effect),  and  finally  Memory.  Hawes  here  takes  occasion 
to  explain  that  his  "  native  language  is  obscure."  A  bit  of 
physiology  comes  next,  for  under  the  "  high  influence  of  the 
planets "  falls  the  discussion  of  the  four  elements  and  four 
humors. 

His  tuition  finished,  Grand  Amour  proceeds  to  the  Tower  of 
Chivalry  and  forth  thence  to  slaughter  giants  with  his  sword 
Clara- Prudence  and  finally  to  pierce  with  it  a  metallic  monster, 
Malice,  —  after  which  feat  he  is  received  by  Pucelle  in  a  hall 
paved  with  precious  stones,  its  windows  of  crystal,  its  walls 
covered  with  arras,  its  roof  "of  marvellous  geometry."  There 
they  are  wedded  by  Church-Law.  In  another  passage,  descrip- 
tive of  Fortune's  hall  with  its  "curiously  branched  roof," 
Hawes  reminds  us  that  he  belonged  to  the  epoch  of  fan-tracery  : 
like  it  his  work  is  studied  and  ornate.  He  has  some  passages 
that  are  full  of  color,  —  notably  the  description  of  Doctrine's 
palace.  His  characteristic  lines  lending  themselves  easily  to 
quotation  read  like  echoes  of  the  proverbial  philosophy  of  his 

day: 

"  After  an  ebb  there  cometh  a  flowing  tide  "... 
"  After  the  day  there  cometh  the  dark  night : 

For  though  the  daye  be  never  so  long 

At  last  the  bell  ringeth  to  evensong." 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  203 

His  literary  enthusiasm  finds  expression  in  a  highly  character- 
istic line,  in  praise 

"  Of  famous  poets  many  years  ago." 

"  Farewell,  sweetheart,  farewell,  farewell,  farewell," 

—  if  read  with  ever  fainter  breath,  a  vanishing  effect,  a  dying 
fall,  will  give  a  just  impression  of  the  pensive  sweetness  long 
drawn  out,  the  attenuated  grace  of  Stephen  Hawes.  His  was 
a  mild  St.  Martin's  summer  of  mediaeval  poetry;  he  was  the 
darling  of  the  ladies  of  the  court  of  Henry  VII. 

Part  of  the  verse-production  of  this  reign  as  of  previous 
ones  was  anonymous  and  popular,  taking  the  form  of  ballads. 
It  is  cause  for  regret  that  as  in  the  case  of  the  Danish  ex- 
amples most  of  them  have  been  preserved  to  us  only  in  the 
adulterated  versions  of  a  later  time.  One  entertaining  speci- 
men, among  the  best  of  its  class,  may  be  safely  ascribed  to  the 
earlier  portion  of  Henry's  reign  —  the  ballad  of  the  Nut-brown 
Maid,  composed  presumably  by  a  woman  to  vindicate  the  con- 
stancy of  her  sex  in  love.  The  maid's  lover  subjects  her 
affection  to  a  series  of  severe  tests ;  he  pretends  that  he  has 
committed  some  breach  of  law  and  must  away  to  the  greenwood 
for  refuge:  she  promises  to  accompany  him  and  is  not  deterred 
by  his  clearly  drawn  picture  of  the  discomforts  and  dangers  of 
woodland  life.  Finally  he  declares  that  he  is  already  provided 
with  a  sweetheart  in  the  forest  who  is  fairer  than  she  and 
whom  he  loves  better,  —  but  the  maid  stands  even  this  search- 
ing test  triumphantly : 

"  '  Though  in  the  wood  I  understood  ye  had  a  paramour, 

All  this  may  not  remove  my  thought  but  that  I  will  be  your  ; 
And  she  shall  find  me  soft  and  kind  and  courteous  every  hour, 
Glad  to  fulfil  all  that  she  will  command  me,  to  my  power ; 
For  had  ye,  lo  !  an  hundred  mo,  yet  would  I  be  that  one, 
For  in  my  mind,  of  all  mankind,  I  love  but  you  alone.'  " 

This  supreme  surrender  overcomes  her  lover  who  comforts 
her  telling  her  that  he  had  only  said  it  to  prove  her  and  re- 


204  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

veals  what  he  had  hitherto  concealed,  that  he  whom  she  has 
won  for  her  husband  by  her  enduring  love  is  an  earl's  son  and 
no  banished  man. 

As  regards  domestic  life  in  this  reign  we  are  provided,  but 
slenderly  as  compared  with  Edward  IV's  time,  with  the  corre- 
spondence of  some  Yorkshire  gentlefolk  that  serves  as  a  con- 
tinuation to  the  Paston  letters,  beginning  where  they  leave  off 
—  but  it  is  by  no  means  as  voluminous  or  as  interesting  as  that 
famous  collection.  The  centre  of  the  new  correspondence  was 
Sir  Robert  Plumpton,  warden  of  Knaresboro'  Castle  ;  and  his 
wife,  the  Lady  Isabel,  held  to  it  a  relation  similar  to  that  that 
Margaret  Paston  held  to  the  earlier  series.  We  are  afforded  a 
vivid  glimpse  of  the  straits  of  one  among  the  many  families 
that  were  drawn  into  the  toils  of  Richard  Empson,  the  king's 
agent ;  he  began  proceedings  against  Sir  Robert  in  1497. 
"The  great  man  E[mpson]  sits  for  assessing  of  fines  for 
knights,"-— fines,  that  is,  levied  upon  persons  who  might  re- 
ceive knighthood  but  who  sought  to  avoid  the  attendant  trouble 
and  expense  —  and  his  correspondent  goes  on  to  warn  Sir 
Robert:  "Your,  adversaries  intend  surely  to  attempt  the  law 
against  you."  Erelong  we  hear  Lady  Plumpton  complaining 
that  she  can  neither  borrow  money  nor  sell  wood  upon  the 
estate  for  everybody  knows  that  she  is  eager  to  sell  and  next 
to  nothing  is  offered  for  the  largest  trees  —  and  meanwhile 
there  is  Lenten  stuff  to  buy.  None  can  tell  what  the  land 
would  bring  for  the  title  is  insecure.  "  We  are  brought  to 
beggar-staff."  Later,  her  husband  sends  her  warning:  "  If  any 
precept  come  from  the  sheriff  to  take  your  cattle  obey  ye  it 
not.  No  cattle  should  be  taken  thereby  but  your  husband's 
cattle  and  he  hath  none  —  and  so  may  ye  make  the  bayly 
answer." 

A  curious  but  by  no  means  exceptional  instance  of  affection 
traded  upon  is  offered  by  a  kinsman  of  the  Plumptons  who 
considers  whether  it  might  not  be  as  well  to  give  his  sister  in 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  205 

marriage  to  a  gentleman  who  loves  her  so  devotedly  that  he 
would  probably  take  her  with  a  smaller  dowry  than  any  other 
would  demand. 

Leaving  Yorkshire  we  cross  the  northern  border  once  again. 
The  young  king  of  Scots,  James  IV,  handsome,  pleasure-loving, 
popular,  was  enjoying  an  influence  rare  for  the  crown  in  his 
distracted  country  which  had  lately  been  rent  by  discords  worse 
than  ordinary.  Under  his  energetic  administration  which  re- 
flected the  spirit  of  the  age  Scotland  enjoyed  a  respite  from 
strife  and  a  measure  of  prosperity.  James  had  splendid  tastes, 
in  especial  a  passion  for  architecture  ;  the  palaces  of  Stirling, 
Holyrood,  Linlithgow  and  Falkland  were  built,  restored  or 
decorated  in  his  reign.  He  loved  music  and  song  :  minstrels, 
rhymers  and  scholars  were  welcome  at  his  gay  court  and  gave 
it  a  finer  lustre.  Its  greatest  literary  ornament  and,  indeed, 
the  chief  of  Scottish  poets  throughout  the  two-hundred  years' 
course  of  independent  Scottish  literature,  was  William  Dunbar. 
Formerly  a  Franciscan  friar  he  had  discarded  the  frock  to 
become  a  dependent  of  the  king  whom  he  served  in  several 
foreign  missions.  He  flattered  the  taste  of  the  age  by  his  alle- 
gorical poems  —  which  are  unusually  successful  specimens  of 
their  class.  His  "Golden  Targe  "  opens  with  a  pretty  descrip- 
tion of  May  —  impaired  as  was  inevitable  then  by  classical 
allusions.  The  "  Targe  "  is  the  shield  with  which  Reason  de- 
fends the  poet  for  awhile  against  the  darts  of  Beauty.  Dunbar's 
finest  production  in  this  vein,  his  best-known  work  and  one  that 
possesses  a  permanent  charm,  is  the  graceful  epithalamium  he 
composed  for  the  king  upon  his  marriage  with  the  Tudor  prin- 
cess Margaret.  "  The  Thistle  and  the  Rose  "  is  its  symbolic 
title  :  it  is  instinct  with  light  and  color  —  the  best  and  most 
characteristic  properties  of  Scottish  poetry. 

Removed  by  a  whole  hemisphere  from  such  play  of  fancy 
and  sentiment  are  the  satirical  pieces  that  Dunbar  penned  in 
an  altered  mood  :  indeed,  but  for  the  well-known  vicissitudes 


206  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

of  mood  to  which  the  human  spirit  is  subject  it  would  be  hard 
to  believe  that  species  of  writing  so  different  could  proceed 
from  the  same  author.  In  his  versified  report  of  the  confabu- 
lation of  some  female  ribalds,  "Two  Married  Women  and  a 
Widow,"  there  is  a  cynical  display  of  an  almost  savage  lust,  of 
hypocritic  cunning  aevoted  to  the  service  of  animal  instinct, 
that  uncovers  an  abyss  of  moral  evil  in  the  social  life  of  Scot- 
land as  the  Middle  Age  was  drawing  to  a  close.  (The  king 
himself  was  a  notorious  libertine.)  Another  tale  of  coarse 
humor  and  intrigue,  "  The  Friars  of  Berwick,"  may  be  ascribed 
to  Dunbar  ;  it  is  quite  in  the  manner  of  the  baser  element  in 
the  Canterbury  Tales. 

We  have  from  him  a  Scotch  version  of  the  "  Dance  of  the 
Seven  Deadly  Sins"  —and  surely  that  grotesque  subject  has 
never  been  treated  with  more  force,  originality  and  grewsome 
realism.  He  addressed  to  the  king  many  rhymed  petitions  for 
places  in  the  church  ;  and  repeated  disappointment  appears 
to  have  inspired  a  series  of  despondent,  moralizing  poems  that 
remind  one  of  Lydgate's  favorite  themes  :  "  the  world  is  false 
and  unstable,"  and  "all  earthly  joy  returns  in  pain."  He  wrote 
"Of  the  World's  Vanity,"  and  "Of  the  Changes  of  Life,"  and 
once  when  he  was  sick  and  in  fear  of  death  composed  a  lament 
for  the  famous  poets  of  Britain  from  Chaucer's  to  his  own  day. 
A  like  occasion,  a  like  mood  doubtless  inspired  his  "  Confession  " 
of  all  sorts  of  sins  :  a  line  in  it  tersely  expresses  the  religious 
attitude  of  his  age  and  of  a  character  such  as  his  :  — 

"  I  trow  in  the  kirk,  to  do  as  it  commandis." 

Submissive  as  he  became  he  could  not  escape  accusation  of 
heresy ;  in  a  "  Flyting  "  or  humorous  dispute  in  verse  his  con- 
temporary and  literary  friend,  Walter  Kennedy,  charged  him 
with  being  a  "Lollard  laureate,  a  lamp  of  Lollards,"  —  doubt- 
less because  of  his  shrewd  hits  at  the  priests  and  the  religious 
orders.  Kennedy  was  of  noble  birth,  well-educated,  and  had 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  207 

travelled  upon  the  Continent.  He  composed  some  devotional 
poems,  a  "Passion  of  Christ  "  and  a  "  Ballad  in  Praise  of  our 
Lady  "  wherein  he  blesses  her  from  top  to  toe  and  begs  her 
intercession  for  "  KENNEDY  her  man." 

Another  noble  author  and  of  greater  distinction  was  Gavin 
Douglas,  whose  "  Palace  of  Honor,"  addressed  to  King  James, 
is  one  of  the  polished,  artificial  allegories  then  in  vogue  at 
court  —  a  dream  of  adventure  on  a  May  morning  among  myth- 
ological personages,  classic  heroes  and  poets,  including  a  course 
over  classic  geography.  As  may  be  imagined,  it  is  tedious 
reading  to-day  ;  yet  it  contains  some  gorgeous  coloring  and 
reveals  its  author's  genuine  and  undiscriminating  passion  for 
the  antique :  it  is  thus  a  monument  of  the  spread  of  renascent 
sentiment  into  remote  Scotland.  Of  that  sentiment  Douglas 
was  the  one  exponent  in  his  day  and  corner  of  the  world.  By 
it  he  was  nerved  to  accomplish  his  great  feat — a  translation  of 
the  ^Eneid  into  the  Scotch  dialect,  in  heroic  couplets.  He 
prefaced  every  book  with  an  original  prologue,  the  seventh  and 
twelfth  of  which  are  gems  of  natural  description.  In  the  former 
we  have  a  picture  drawn  from  his  own  observation  of  the  effect 
of  winter  wind  and  cold  upon  the  sea,  upon  streams  and  fields, 
cattle  and  men  ;  in  the  latter,  the  converse  of  this, —  the  effect 
of  the  spring  sun  upon  the  atmosphere,  the  sea  and  land,  cities 
and  meadows,  trees,  flowers,  birds  and  beasts,  and  finally  upon 
man.  Many  passages  in  these  are  almost  startlingly  modern 
in  delicacy  and  accuracy  of  observation,  in  the  light  with  which 
they  are  irradiated  and  the  color  with  which  they  are  imbued. 

At  the  very  close  of  our  period  printing  was  introduced  into 
the  northern  kingdom  and  the  new  literature  was  thus  put 
into  wider  circulation  by  Walter  Chepman,  a  cloth-merchant  of 
Edinborough.  Under  the  king's  patronage,  Chepman  set  up  a 
press  in  his  house  and  furnished  the  capital,  a  junior  partner, 
Andrew  Miller,  who  had  learned  the  art  in  France,  doing  the 
printing.  In  the  autumn  of  the  year  1507  they  received  a  royal 


208  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

patent  "  to  imprint  books  of  laws,  acts  of  parliament,  chronicles, 
mass-books  and  legends  of  Scotch  saints,  and  all  other  books 
that  shall  seem  necessary."  Poems,  romances  and  ballads,  in 
the  judgment  of  the  shrewd  partners,  seemed  evidently  to 
belong  to  the  last  class  and  issued  from  their  press  before  the 
heavier  kind  of  literature  specified  in  the  patent.  In  1508  the 
first  book  printed  in  Scotland  was  put  upon  the  market :  it 
comprised  some  popular  romances  of  chivalry,  the  "  Gest  of 
Robin  Hood,"  the  "Maying"  of  Chaucer,  the  "Golden  Targe," 
"Book  of  Good  Counsel  to  the  King,"  "Two  Married  Women 
and  the  Widow,"  and  "A  Lament  for  the  Makers"  (/>.,  poets), 
all  by  Dunbar,  and  the  "  Flyting "  of  Dunbar  and  Kennedy. 
Then  appeared  a  breviary,  in  parts,  completed  in  the  summer 
of  1510;  of  other  works  that  may  have  issued  from  Chepman's 
press  nothing  is  known.  The  defeat  and  death  of  James  IV 
at  Flodden  demoralized  the  nation:  the  light  of  literature  paled 
and  a  press  could  no  longer  be  supported. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  209 


VII. 

WE  now  approach  one  of  the  mightiest  periods  in  human 
history  —  the  era  pf  the  Reformation;  an  era  crowded  with 
great  characters  and  great  events,  confused  with  conflicting 
aims ;  it  is  at  once  one  of  the  most  tempting  and  difficult  of 
subjects,  —  it  seems  inexhaustible,  oceanic. 

In  the  first  half  of  the  sixteenth  century  there  appeared  in 
Europe  a  constellation  of  crowned  heads,  effulgent,  almost  ab- 
solute in  might  and  glory,  foremost  among  them  being  Henry 
VIII,  Francis  I,  and  Charles  V.  Off  in  the  extreme  south-west 
reigned  a  most  opulent  king,  John  III  of  Portugal,  —  the  rich- 
est sovereign  in  Europe,  for  his  treasuries  were  filled  with  the 
gold  and  silver  of  the  Indies  and  his  capital,  Lisbon,  which 
had  attracted  to  its  capacious  port  the  eastern  trade  formerly 
enjoyed  by  the  cities  of  Italy,  was  now  become  the  principal 
mart  of  the  world.  In  the  extreme  north-east  there  rose  a 
strong  and  beneficent  king,  Gustavus  Vasa  —  founder  of  the 
greatness  of  Sweden.  All  these  monarchs  were  practically 
absolute  within  their  several  dominions ;  only  among  them- 
selves was  any  effectual  constraint  put  upon  each  other's  power 
and  pretensions.  The  collapse  of  feudalism  was  complete. 

The  supreme  political  factors  upon  the  continent  of  Europe 
were  four  in  number,  and  three  of  them  were  marshalled  against 
one  —  the  emperor  Charles  V.  It  is  necessary  to  bear  in  mind 
the  tremendous  power  of  Spain  throughout  this  century:  the 
union  of  Castile  and  Aragon  and  the  resulting  conquest  of 
Granada  had  created  a  potent  nationality  cemented  by  a  som- 
bre religious  enthusiasm,  —  and  Spain  was  suddenly  lifted  to 
the  first  place  in  Europe.  At  the  same  time  streams  of  pre- 
cious metals  poured  in  upon  her  from  the  new  world  —  but 


210  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

this  was  not  an  unalloyed  blessing :  the  Spaniards  came  out  of 
the  Middle  Ages  with  a  knightly  contempt  of  labor,  —  they  got 
gold  by  fighting,  and  it  enervated  the  realm  at  last:  the  indus- 
trial movement  of  the  preceding  generation,  slight  enough  as  it 
was,  subsided  under  the  blight  of  the  American  conquests  and 
erelong  ceased.  For  the  time  being,  however,  the  strength 
and  influence  of  Spain  were  vast,  —  sufficient  of  themselves  to 
give  her  young  king  a  commanding  position  in  the  polity  of 
Europe.  Charles  was  beside  king  of  the  Two  Sicilies  ;  Aus- 
tria and  the  Netherlands  were  in  his  domain ;  in  the  year  1519 
the  crowns  of  Lombardy  and  the  Empire  were  united  upon  his 
brow :  thus  he  had  the  whole  continent  in  his  grasp,  —  his  was 
the  widest  sway  since  Charlemagne. 

This  prodigious  power  was  a  menace  to  the  liberty,  to  the 
very  existence  of  the  other  states  of  Europe;  Charles  was  more 
dreaded  than  the  pitiless  Turk;  Francis  I  made  it  his  life- 
work  to  struggle  with  him  —  and  with  the  cooperation  of  the 
Protestant  princes  of  Germany  and  of  Suleiman  II  managed 
to  make  head  against  him  and  to  maintain  a  precarious  bal- 
ance of  forces.  Such  were  the  four  political  factors  of  the 
Reformation  era.  A  singular  spectacle !  —  a  Catholic  king  of 
France,  German  Protestants  and  a  Turkish  sultan  forced  into 
combination  against  the  power  of  Charles  V. 

The  transition  from  feudalism  was  accomplished ;  that  from 
mediaeval  Catholicism  was  now  in  progress.  It  is  commonly 
taught  that  the  Middle  Ages  came  to  an  end  with  feudalism, 
—  but  that  was  only  one  and  on  the  whole  a  lesser  feature  of 
those  ages ;  while  the  mediaeval  church  yet  stood,  with  its 
system  of  education,  morals  and  worship,  its  monasteries  and 
nunneries,  cardinalate  and  papacy,  it  is  erroneous  to  say  that 
the  Middle  Ages  were  over.  That  could  not  be  said,  either, 
until  their  municipal  life  was  extinct ;  until  the  civic  activity 
of  old,  the  freedom  of  the  city  republics  of  Italy,  the  power  of 
a  great  institution  like  the  Hanseatic  League  had  also  passed 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  211 

away.  Never  had  the  mediaeval  church  seemed  more  magnifi- 
cent than  in  the  first  quarter  of  the  sixteenth  century  under 
the  splendid  pontificate  of  Leo  X ;  we  can  now  see  that  its 
institutions  that  then  seemed  impregnable  were  in  reality  but 
hollow  shells  only  needing  a  touch  to  crumble  away.  The 
principal  interest  of  the  history  of  the  first  half  of  the  century 
lies  in  the  mighty  religious  revolution  that  went  forward  despite 
many  checks  in  the  north  of  Europe.  It  was  a  conflict  of 
north  and  south,  —  of  Teuton,  Saxon,  Norseman  against 
Roman,  Celt  and  Frank,  —  of  the  more  moral  against  the 
more  ideal,  —  of  the  English  and  German  languages  against 
the  universal  Latin,  —  of  the  ideas  of  Wyclif,  Huss  and  the 
Lollards  against  those  of  the  succeeding  age;  and  not  of 
Wyclif  and  Huss  only  but  also  of  the  reformers  of  a  century 
or  two  before  their  time  :  of  the  almost  forgotten  Waldenses, 
of  Friar  Berthold  and  Robert  of  Lincoln.  The  historian  would 
err  greatly  who  neglected  the  thought  and  work  of  those  early 
leaders  of  the  reformation,  of  a  strenuous  evangelicalism  that 
was  never  totally  extinguished  throughout  the  Middle  Ages 
and  that  emerged  with  power  at  their  close.  And  so  we 
behold  a  tremendous  conflict  waged  over  all  Europe  with 
alternate  failure  and  success  between  evangelical  doctrine, 
the  Scriptures  and  preaching  on  the  one  hand,  and  on  the 
other  the  sacramental  and  sacerdotal  system  of  the  mediaeval 
church.  The  tide  of  reform  flowed  and  ebbed  and  flowed 
again ;  there  were  eager  forward  movements  and  violent  reac- 
tions :  it  was  a  giant  oscillation  that  cradled  a  new  world  into 
being  —  and  it  went  on  with  the  greatest  ease,  evenness  and 
success  under  the  strong  hands  of  Henry  VIII  and  Gustavus 
Vasa. 

In  the  capital  of  Christendom  itself  the  faith  of  former  time 
was  dead :  skepticism  was  so  general  and  daring  that  the  fifth 
Lateran  council,  held  by  Leo  X,  thought  it  expedient  (to 
Luther's  great  disgust)  to  promulgate  anew  the  doctrine  of 


212  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

the  immortality  of  the  soul  against  the  philosopher  Pompo- 
nazzi,  who  had  denied  that  it  could  be  proved  by  reason  or 
out  of  the  writings  of  Aristotle.  From  the  same  synod  issued 
a  fresh  assertion  of  papal  supremacy  and  shortly,  with  almost 
cynical  disregard  of  the  awakening  conscience  of  Europe, 
there  was  published  by  the  Curia  a  greatly  enlarged  and  scien- 
tifically classified  inventory  of  sins  with  the  prices  of  accom- 
panying pardons.  Yet  in  the  days  of  Leo  X  Italian  humanism 
put  forth  its  consummate  flower,  —  not  as  winsome,  fresh  and 
fragrant  as  in  the  time  of  Lorenzo  his  father,  but  full-blown 
and  gorgeous  :  rarely  in  the  annals  of  mankind  has  there  shone 
such  a  galaxy  of  genius  and  talent  as  then  graced  the  courts 
of  Rome,  Florence,  and  Ferrara.  Leo's  secretary  was  the 
cultivated  and  fastidious  Bembo,  who  piqued  himself  on  the 
classic  purity  of  his  Latinity  and  the  almost  equal  elegance 
of  his  Italian  style.  He  encouraged  the  use  of  the  vernacular 
by  men  of  letters  and  gave  them  an  example  of  refined  rhetoric 
in  the  elaborate  discussion  as  to  the  nature  of  love  held  by 
"gli  Asolani."  Of  greater  importance  for  universal  literature 
was  the  dramatic  poet  Gian-Giorgio  Trissino  :  his  tragedy  of 
"  Sofonisba "  achieved  such  conspicuous  and  instantaneous 
success  that  it  secured  for  its  author  the  favorable  notice  of 
the  pope,  who  appointed  him  to  be  one  of  his  ambassadors. 
The  work  appeared  in  the  year  1515:  it  was  the  first  of  its 
kind  in  Italy  that  gave  evidence  of  spontaneity  of  native 
genius :  there  had  been  nothing  before  but  feeble  imitations 
of  the  antique.  As  is  natural  in  nascent  drama,  "  Sofonisba  " 
is  a  tale  of  turgid  passion  couched  in  a  style  that  is  by  com- 
parison weak  and  frigid  :  it  is  full  of  long,  studied  and  declama- 
tory speeches  :  but  its  significance  can  be  gauged  by  this,  that 
they  are  cast  in  blank  verse.  The  origin  of  so  important  a 
form  is  of  such  interest  that  Trissino's  reasons  for  using  it  are 
worth  citing;  in  the  dedication  of  his  tragedy  to  Pope  Leo  he 
explains  that  he  uses  Italian  so  as  to  be  popularly  understood 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  213 

and  blank  verse  because  it  is  best  suited  to  express  emotion  : 
rhyme,  which  suggests  careful  thought,  is  not  adapted  for 
emotional  utterance,  which  as  it  is  not  must  not  seem  studied  : 
moreover,  blank  verse  has  a  certain  dignity.  This  last  remark 
is  weightier  than  it  seems :  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  new 
poetic  medium  originated  in  an  endeavor  to  catch  the  effect  of  the 
inimitable  unrhymed  measure  of  the  ancients.  And  so  Trissino 
has  the  credit  of  having  devised  this  simple,  flexible  and  hence- 
forth indispensable  form —  one  of  the  most  precious  legacies 
of  the  Italian  Renascence  to  modern  literature.  There  is 
evidence,  however,  that  before  him  others  were  experimenting 
in  this  line ;  the  credit  of  prior  invention  would  seem  to  belong 
to  Giacomo  Sannazaro,  a  Neapolitan,  —  in  the  fourth  eclogue 
of  his  "  Arcadia,"  published  fully  ten  years  before  the  "  Sofo- 
nisba,"  there  occurs  a  considerable  passage  in  blank  verse. 
The  work  is  otherwise  of  importance,  for  it  heads  the  list  of 
those  classico-romantic  pastorals  that  were  exceedingly  fashion- 
able for  many  generations,  —  pictures  of  an  ideal  country  life 
in  the  open  air  —  colloquies  of  Platonic  shepherds  and  shep- 
herdesses on  mountain  lawns  or  in  flowery  fields  by  running 
streams  under  green  boughs. 

Giovanni  Rucellai,  a  cousin  of  the  pope  and  his  ambassador 
to  the  court  of  France,  was  the  next  distinguished  writer  to 
employ  blank  verse,  in  a  didactic  poem  of  fifteen  hundred 
lines  inspired  by  one  of  Virgil's  Georgics,  —  "  Le  Api  "-  —  "  the 
Bees."  He  also  produced  a  tragedy,  "Rosmunda,"  for  his 
cousin's  entertainment. 

Meanwhile  in  Florence  the  sinister  Macchiavelli  had  just 
published  his  manual  of  a  portentous  political  science  which 
was  yet  nothing  more  than  the  practice  of  the  rulers  of  Italy  in 
his  day :  they  had  succeeded  in  effecting  a  divorce  of  govern- 
ment and  morals  quite  as  complete  as  that  already  achieved 
between  morals  and  religion.  When  a  state  has  been  con- 
quered, says  Macchiavelli,  every  scion  of  the  reigning  family 


214  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

should  be  killed  off,  or,  if  it  has  been  accustomed  to  govern 
itself,  it  should  be  effectually  ruined  and  then  garrisoned. 
A  successful  usurper  should  establish  his  power  by  a  general 
massacre.  A  prince  may  abide  by  his  engagements  when 
convenient ;  he  should  seek  a  reputation  for  honor  and  talk 
much  of  good  faith ;  he  should  also  be  accounted  liberal  and 
to  this  end  should  be  lavish  of  the  possessions  of  his  enemies 
but  scrupulous  as  to  laying  fresh  taxes  upon  his  people. 
Macchiavelli  breaks  out  in  admiration  and  commendation  of 
the  triumphant  craft  of  Caesar  Borgia :  he  was  his  political 
paragon.  A  characteristic  discussion  is  that  as  to  whether 
it  is  better  for  a  ruler  to  be  feared  or  loved ;  the  misanthrope 
concludes  that  human  nature  is  so  changeable,  selfish  and 
contemptible  that  it  is  better  to  be  feared :  punishment  is  the 
surest  means  of  control. 

"The  Prince"  merely  spoke  out  the  open  secret  of  all  the 
tyrants  of  Italy.  When  he  had  finished  it  Macchiavelli  turned 
to  his  profound  "  Discourses  upon  Titus  Livius." 

The  greatest  poet  of  the  age  flourished  at  the  court  of  the 
Estes  at  Ferrara.  There  in  the  last  century,  in  his  "  Orlando 
Innamorato,"  Bojardo  had  told  over  again  the  story  of  the 
favorite  hero  of  mediaeval  romance  in  verse  that  was  too  rude 
for  a  later,  more  refined  generation.  The  subject  was  worked 
over  in  a  bright  style  by  Francesco  Berni,  —  but  the  final  and 
incomparable  version  was  Ariosto's.  In  the  year  1516  appeared 
forty  cantos  of  his  "Orlando  Furioso";  six  supplementary 
cantos  were  added  later ;  the  first  complete  edition  was  pub- 
published  at  Ferrara  in  1532.  The  following  year  the  poet 
died. 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  the  incidents,  the  theme  of  this  great 
poem  —  the  fury  in  love  and  warfare  of  Charlemagne's  paladin, 
Roland  —  are  thoroughly  mediaeval ;  though  touched  with  the 
finer  taste,  fancy  and  sensuousness  of  the  Renascence  it  is 
yet  a  tale  of  chivalry. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  215 

This  was  the  period  of  the  utmost  glory  of  Renascent  art, 
—  of  the  exquisite  school  of  Milan  under  da  Vinci,  Luini  and 
Ferrari,  —  the  sumptuous  school  of  Venice  under  Giorgione, 
Palma  and  Titian,  —  of  Correggio  at  Parma,  del  Sarto  and 
the  rest  at  Florence,  and  Bazzi  at  Siena;  it  was  typed  in  the 
magnificent  reception  that  Pope  Leo  gave  to  the  reconstructed 
college  of  cardinals  in  apartments  of  the  Vatican  just  decorated 
by  Raphael.  But  there  was  a  spirit  that  deeply  felt  the  differ- 
ence between  what  was  and  what  ought  to  have  been,  and  in 
the  wonderful  figure  of  "  the  Slave "  the  indignant  Angelo 
compressed  the  speechless  agony  of  his  great  soul  over  the 
enslavement  of  his  native  land. 

His  tutor  Torrigiano  spent  several  years  in  England  making 
the  famous  tomb  of  Henry  VII  and  his  queen  that  may  be 
seen  in  his  fan-vaulted  chapel  at  Westminster.  Another  Italian 
artist  named  Benedetto  was  engaged  by  Wolsey  to  execute  a 
tomb  for  him  at  Windsor. 

The  gabled  halls  of  Brasenose  College  at  Oxford,  begun  in 
the  year  1512  (the  year  that  Torrigiano  arrived  in  London), 
are  interesting  relics  of  the  collegiate  architecture  of  Henry 
VIII's  reign.  At  the  same  time  the  beautiful  tower  of  Mag- 
dalen was  rising.  The  intellectual  ambition  of  the  time  found 
expression  in  many  scholastic  foundations  :  Margaret,  Countess 
of  Richmond,  mother  of  the  late  king,  had  just  established  two 
colleges  at  Cambridge ;  at  Oxford,  Bishop  Fox  began  to  build 
Corpus  Christi,  Wolsey  endowed  a  Greek  lectureship,  and  in 
1524  suppressed  an  old  priory  and  erected  Christ  Church 
upon  its  site.  We  have  in  this  church  a  fine  example  of  fan- 
tracery  vaulting ;  English  architecture  was  still  Gothic  and 
mediaeval. 

Scholasticism  still  cumbered  the  ground,  but  the  vehement 
efforts  its  partisans  made  to  sustain  it,  their  loud  vociferations, 
showed  that  the  system  was  in  its  last  stages.  Feeling  ran 
high  between  the  disciples  of  the  old  and  the  new  learning ; 


216  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

the  quiet  cloisters  of  Oxford  rang  with  their  debates  which 
not  seldom  ended  in  blows.  The  old  order  was  changing, 
giving  place  to  new. 

One  would  have  an  inadequate  idea  of  the  age  of  Henry 
VIII  who  did  not  perceive  under  its  external  brilliancy  the 
pathos  that  attends  the  decline  and  fall  of  great  and  once 
beneficent  institutions.  A  profound  pathos  invests  the  decay 
of  old  ideals  —  but  God  fulfils  himself  in  many  ways  lest  one 
good  custom  outgrown  should  corrupt  the  world.  And  the  grief 
is  generally  forgotten  in  the  midst  of  the  magnificence  of  the 
age.  It  was  the  last  effulgence  of  mediaevalism  —  the  last 
intense  crimson  and  golden  glow  of  the  long  mediaeval  day. 
But  there  was  a  light  within  that  light ;  the  sunset  of  the 
Middle  Ages  paled  before  the  new  sun  of  modern  times,  and 
the  color  of  the  former  half  of  Henry's  reign  faded  out  into 
the  broad  white  glare  of  the  latter  part.  So  it  was  with  the 
century :  it  began  mediaeval,  it  ended  modern. 

We  have  in  Henry  VIII  a  striking  illustration  of  the  popular 
belief  that  fathers  transmit  their  peculiar  qualities  to  their 
daughters  and  mothers  to  their  sons, — for  his  character  is 
illuminated  by  reading  into  it  that  of  his  maternal  grandfather. 
With  Edward  IV  we  are  already  acquainted ;  his  daughter 
Elizabeth  (queen  to  Henry  VII)  inherited  from  him  her  fine 
figure,  beautiful  countenance  and  engaging  manners,  and 
transmitted  them,  together  with  his  appetite  for  pleasure  and 
magnificence  and  —  most  important  of  all  —  his  determined 
will,  to  her  son.  Henry  was  seventeen  years  old  when  he 
came  to  the  throne  and  a  burst  of  popular  rejoicing,  long  pent 
up  under  the  severe  represssion  of  his  father's  reign,  greeted 
the  handsome  young  prince  at  his  accession.  His  was  certainly 
an  attractive,  indeed  a  superior  character.  His  physique  was 
fine  and  he  was  fond  of  all  knightly  exercises.  He  was  a 
good  scholar,  especially  in  languages,  and  had  refined  tastes  — 
loved  painting  and  music,  which  he  practised  a  little  himself ; 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  217 

he  composed  some  masses  that  were  sung  in  his  royal  chapel. 
He  was  moreover  well  instructed  in  mediaeval  divinity  and 
polity  and  piqued  himself  somewhat  upon  his  attainments  in 
that  line  ;  he  was  an  expert  in  theological  discussion.  The  force 
and  fascination  of  his  personality  may  be  estimated  by  this,  that 
he  retained,  if  not  the  early  affection,  at  least  the  admiring  awe 
of  his  people  all  through  his  long  reign  of  nearly  forty  years. 

He  was  crowned  with  his  queen,  Catherine  of  Aragon,  in 
June,  1509,  a  few  days  before  his  eighteenth  birthday.  He 
and  his  people  were  at  one  in  their  willingness  to  make  a  sharp 
distinction  between  his  and  his  father's  administration :  Empson 
and  Dudley,  the  instruments  of  the  old  king's  rapacity,  were 
cast  into  the  Tower  and  erelong  beheaded,  and  his  chancellor 
and  minister,  Archbishop  Warham,  a  man  of  mediocre  talents 
whom  Henry  never  regarded  with  particular  favor,  was  eclipsed 
and  at  last  edged  out  by  Thomas  Wolsey. 

The  young  king  hastened  to  waste  the  treasure  so  painfully 
collected  by  his  father  in  tournaments,  splendid  entertainments 
and  wars.  He  continued  the  time-worn,  ancestral  policy  of 
hostility  to  France,  invaded  that  country  in  the  summer  of 
1513,  and  achieved  a  glittering  success  in  the  Battle  of  Spurs. 
The  year  following,  however,  perceiving  that  he  was  being 
tricked  by  his  father-in-law  of  Spain,  he  veered  round,  made 
a  peace  with  the  French  king  which  he  cemented  by  the  gift 
of  his  sister  Mary  in  marriage,  and  began  a  series  of  negotia- 
tions that  culminated  in  the  pageantry  of  the  Field  of  the 
Cloth  of  Gold  in  the  summer  of  1520.  His  position  was  a 
novel  one  for  an  English  king ;  in  possession  of  a  copious 
treasure,  at  the  head  of  an  insular  kingdom,  strong,  compact, 
and  happily  freed  from  the  burden  and  embarrassment  of  con- 
tinental dependencies  (which  it  was  well  that  he  could  not 
recover),  Henry  was  able  to  play  a  distinguished  part  upon 
the  theatre  of  European  diplomacy  and  to  pose  as  an  arbiter 
between  mighty  opposites. 


218  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

In  Wolsey  the  king  found  a  minister  after  his  own  heart. 
Of  affable  manners  and  splendid  tastes,  fond  of  architecture, 
fine  gardens,  spectacles  and  shows,  yet  of  extraordinary  capacity 
for  public  affairs,  Wolsey  was  unique  in  English  history  in  the 
number  of  great  offices  that  were  heaped  upon  him  in  succes- 
sive years.  Beginning  as  royal  chaplain  and  almoner,  he  was 
summoned  to  the  king's  council,  was  appointed  dean  and  then 
bishop  of  Lincoln,  and  was  almost  immediately  afterward 
elevated  to  the  archbishopric  of  York.  The  next  year — 1515 
—  Pope  Leo  made  him  a  cardinal  at  the  king's  own  request 
and  the  great  seal  of  the  chancellor,  taken  from  Warham,  was 
conferred  upon  him.  In  1517  the  pope,  still  acting  under 
pressure  from  the  king  and  as  a  special  favor  to  him,  invested 
Wolsey  with  legislative  powers  over  the  English  church.  He 
was  now  the  lordliest,  most  magnificent  prelate  that  England 
had  ever  beheld,  —  the  final,  full-blown  type  of  an  ecclesiastical 
statesman  of  the  Middle  Age ;  he  held  to  the  church  the  same 
relation  that  the  great  earl  of  Warwick  held  to  English  feudalism. 
And  that  very  year  Martin  Luther  posted  his  theses  against 
indulgences  on  the  door  of  the  castle  church  at  Wittenberg. 

Strange  as  it  may  seem,  a  weighty  motive  of  this  accumula- 
tion of  high  offices  was  a  desire  of  reform :  a  feeling  was 
gaining  ground  that  something  must  be  done  to  reform  the 
corrupt  church.  Archbishop  Warham  had  attempted  the  task 
in  a  feeble  way  and  found  it  too  great  for  his  powers ;  he  was 
thrust  aside  and  Wolsey  was  invested  with  unlimited  power 
over  the  church.  For  as  papal  legate  he  was  superior  to  the 
archbishop  of  Canterbury  and  moreover  could  do  what  no 
bishop  could — he  could  inspect,  control,  suppress  monasteries. 
To  effect  a  disciplinary  reform  of  the  clergy  both  regular  and 
secular — such  was  in  large  measure  the  motive  of  these 
combinations. 

In  the  early  years  of  the  reign,  in  the  midst  of  the  jubilant 
rebound  from  the  repression  of  former  years,  Lollardy  rose  to 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  219 

the  surface ;  prosecutions  for  heresy  were  renewed,  the  prin- 
cipal  point   involved   being   transubstantiation ;    in   the   year 
1511   the  movement  excited  general  attention  and  alarm,— 
several   Lollards    were   forced   to   recant,   some   preferred   to 
suffer  death. 

The  Lollards  of  London  flocked  to  hear  the  evangelical 
preaching  of  the  dean  of  Saint  Paul's,  John  Colet  —  altogether 
the  most  significant  character  in  the  English  church  at  that  day. 
He  deplored  schism  and  advocated  a  reform  within  the  church : 
his  was  a  voice  coming  from  within,  like  conscience,  calling 
upon  the  body  to  repent  —  and  when  such  warning  voices  die 
unheeded  the  retribution  and  the  only  remedy  is  schism.  His 
prophetic,  apostolic  character  was  manifested  in  his  self-denying 
life  and  simple  attire.  The  king  respected  and  admired  him 
for  with  all  his  earnestness  he  was  free  from  taint  of  fanaticism. 
When  the  spread  of  heresy  impelled  the  summoning  of  convo- 
cation in  the  winter  of  1512  Colet  was  chosen  as  preacher ;  it 
was  the  opportunity  of  his  life  and  in  a  stirring  sermon,  in 
Latin,  he  proclaimed  the  duty,  the  necessity  of  immediate 
reform.  He  attributed  to  the  evil  lives  of  her  ministers  the 
patent  corruption  of  the  church ;  the  impurity  of  priests,  he 
said,  is  the  most  grievous  heresy.  He  took  his  text  from  the 
twelfth  chapter  of  St.  Paul's  epistle  to  the  Romans  and 
admonished  the  assembled  bishops  and  clergy  in  fearless  tones 
not  to  be  conformed  to  the  world  in  pride  of  place,  feasting 
and  pleasures  of  the  senses,  pursuit  of  rich  benefices,  worldly 
business  and  distractions,  but  to  be  reformed  to  humility, 
temperance,  charity  and  a  spiritual  life.  And  the  reform  must 
commence  with  those  of  highest  station  :  the  bishops  should  be 
spiritually-minded  men,  clear  of  all  •simony,  should  reside  in 
their  sees,  abstain  from  everything  unbecoming  their  high 
office  and  carefully  strain  out  unworthy  applicants  for  orders : 
thus  the  reformation  would  be  extended  to  the  priesthood  and 
through  it  finally  to  the  people. 


220  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

Colet's  sermon  made  a  deep  impression ;  it  was  translated 
into  English  and  purely  practical  though  it  was  the  bishop  of 
London  brought  against  the  preacher  a  charge  of  heresy ;  he 
was  however  protected  by  a  powerful  sympathizer  —  the  arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  —  and  the  year  following  was  invited  to 
preach  before  the  king.  The  whole  country  was  looking 
forward  to  the  war  with  France  upon  which  the  king  had  set 
his  heart  —  but  Colet  in  the  courage  of  his  convictions  con- 
demned that  war.  The  king's  conscience  was  touched ;  he 
sent  for  the  preacher  and  for  more  than  an  hour  they  conferred 
together  in  the  palace  garden.  From  that  hour  none  of  Colet's 
foes  ventured  to  assail  him. 

A  picturesque  event  was  the  pilgrimage  that  Colet  and  Eras- 
mus took  together  —  a  last  pilgrimage  to  Canterbury.  The  two 
friends  found  the  relics  exhibited,  the  mouldering  rags  and 
bones,  repulsive  to  a  degree,  and  were  completely  convinced 
of  the  inefficacy  of  pilgrimages  as  a  means  of  salvation. 

In  the  fall  of  1515  the  great  preacher  had  an  opportunity  to 
inculcate  sound  politics  in  the  sermon  he  was  asked  to  deliver 
upon  the  occasion  of  Wolsey's  installation  as  cardinal.  His 
friend  More  had  just  embodied  a  social  ideal  in  his  "  Utopia." 
The  brightest  minds  of  the  day  were  much  exercised  over  the 
political  and  economic  situation. 

Colet's  attitude  toward  the  schoolmen  was  antagonistic  :  he 
condemned  Aquinas  for  having  adulterated  the  simplicity  of 
the  Gospel  with  philosophical  refinements.  Toward  the  new 
learning  upon  its  purely  literary  side  he  was  no  less  hostile  ; 
he  exhorted  his  hearers  to  shun  pagan  culture  as  a  vain  and 
worldly  thing  and  to  beware  of  the  books  of  heathen  philoso- 
phers unless  they  would  become  associates  of  demons.  Herein 
his  Montanistic  strain  is  revealed ;  such  a  narrow  and  partial 
outlook  contrasts  painfully  with  Erasmus's  genial,  catholic 
suggestion :  "  Perhaps  the  spirit  of  God  is  shed  abroad  more 
widely  than  we  think." 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  221 

Colet  was  a  reformer  and  of  too  earnest  a  spirit  to  jest  and 
enjoy.  His  business  was  to  call  men  back  to  the  Bible, 
especially  to  the  writings  of  St.  Paul,  whom  he  esteemed  as  the 
"  wisest  of  men."  He  was  uncompromising  in  his  Augustinian- 
ism  :  man  is  by  nature  evil,  ignorant,  utterly  without  the  divine ; 
the  world  is  like  the  restless  sea  and  men  are  as  fish  beneath 
its  surface,  in  a  state  of  death  and  darkness,  —  they  have  to  be 
drawn  from  it  to  see  the  light.  In  this  body  of  ours,  so  vile, 
dark  and  mortal,  a  pure,  bright  and  deathless  soul  may  yet 
dwell.  And  God  knew  before  those  who  should  be  fitted  for 
his  mysteries,  —  those  who  cleave  less  closely  to  this  world  ; 
they  are  called  and  chosen  out  of  the  mass  according  to  his 
wise  and  holy  will ;  their  minds  are  illumined  by  his  presence, 
their  wills  corrected.  For  the  divine  artificer  moulds  men  as 
wax,  moves  them  as  stones,  and  so  constructs  his  church. 
The  thought  of  one  Spirit  in  many  persons  is  a  favorite  one 
with  Colet. 

With  such  postulates  as  to  our  nature  the  union  of  the 
divine  and  the  human  becomes  a  serious  problem.  Colet's 
view  of  the  Incarnation  was  that  the  iron  of  Christ's  humanity 
was  attracted  and  upheld  by  his  divinity  as  by  a  magnet. 

His  teaching  on  the  subject  of  marriage  proves  that  he  still 
belonged  to  the  monastic  age:  marriage  is  God's  condescension 
to  man's  weakness ;  it  is  not  good  in  itself  and  is  but  the  lesser 
of  two  evils  ;  if  one  can  do  without  it  he  ought  to.  "  If  only 
all  the  faithful  had  remained  chaste  the  heathen  would  have 
supplied  new  material  for  the  church,  and  when  all  the  heathen 
were  converted  the  kingdom  of  God  would  have  come,  and  if 
all  men  had  thus  come  to  an  end  —  what  end  more  desirable 
to  this  pilgrimage  ?  But  man's  weakness  delays  Christ's 
return  !  " 

In  his  project  of  a  disciplinary  reform  within  the  church 
Colet  was  ably  and  ardently  seconded  by  Erasmus,  who  brought 
to  the  cause  a  finer  scholarship  and  a  trenchant  weapon  of 


222  OUTLINE    OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

satire  and  gave  the  idea  currency  upon  the  continent.  In  his 
"  Praise  of  Folly  "  Erasmus  launched  out  in  unsparing  satire 
upon  luxurious  popes  and  bishops,  lazy  and  ignorant  monks 
and  friars  and  quibbling  schoolmen  —  nor  did  he  fail  to  score, 
in  passing,  those  princes  who  careless  of  the  public  good  sought 
only  their  own  pleasure.  The  book  attained  a  European 
circulation ;  indeed,  Erasmus  recalls  Petrarch  by  the  dicta- 
torial position  he  occupied  in  the  republic  of  letters.  In  1516 
appeared  his  revision  of  the  Greek  text  of  the  New  Testament 
—  a  monument  of  critical  scholarship. 

A  like  reformatory  movement  was  in  progress  in  France 
inspired  by  a  like  enthusiasm  for  Biblical  studies.  Lefevre 
d' Staples,  of  the  University  of  Paris,  commented  upon  the 
New  Testament  in  the  original,  dwelling  especially  upon  the 
epistles  of  St.  Paul,  applied  himself  to  amending  the  text  of 
the  Vulgate  and  even  ventured  to  translate  the  Gospels  and 
Pauline  epistles  into  the  vernacular.  Conservative  Spain  too 
felt  the  stir  of  the  new  Biblical  scholarship :  at  the  University 
of  Alcala,  lately  founded  by  the  austere  Cardinal  Ximenez,  and 
under  his  patronage,  the  learned  Lebrija  got  out  a  famous 
polyglot  edition  of  the  Scriptures. 

If  Colet  commanded  the  respect,  more,  the  veneration  of 
rasmus,  More  drew  forth  his  admiring  affection  —  and  surely 

is  one  of  the  most  lovable  characters  in  history.  The  subtle 
blend  of  seriousness  and  humor  that  made  him  so  winning 
comes  out  in  the  "Utopia,"  in  which  deep  thoughts  far  in 
advance  of  the  age  are  mingled  with  many  a  playful  fancy. 
The  beings  of  that  Platonic  dream  held  that  reasonable  pleasure 
is  accordant  with  the  will  of  God ;  they  therefore  condemned 
the  ascetic  life  as  cruel  to  one's  self  and  thankless  to  the 
Creator,  —  as  though  one  would  not  be  indebted  to  him  and 
so  refused  all  his  gracious  gifts.  In  Utopia  was  no  persecution 
for  conscience'  sake,  for  they  held  that  a  man  cannot  force  his 
religious  beliefs  and  that  various  forms  of  worship  might 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  223 

proceed  from  the  same  God,  who  might  inspire  different  men 
different  ways  and  be  pleased  with  that  variety.  A  novel 
liberality !  It  is  a  pity  that  More  did  not  entrust  the  work  to 
his  native  language  for  it  would  then  have  enjoyed  a  wider  and 
longer  circulation.  His  "  History  of  Richard  III "  shows  how 
well  he  could  write  in  English,  though  its  style  —  doubtless 
because  it  was  a  first  essay  at  historical  composition  —  is  still 
too  much  in  bondage  to  Latin  syntax.  It  is  bright  and  interest- 
ing reading  and  is  set  off  with  speeches  in  character,  in  the 
manner  of  Thucydides,  —  the  argument  of  the  queen-mother  in 
sanctuary  at  Westminster  is  acute  and  spirited.  At  the  end  of 
the  description  of  Jane  Shore  occurs  the  author's  mournful 
comment :  "  Men  use,  if  they  have  an  evil  turn,  to  write  it  in 
marble  ;  and  whoso  doth  us  a  good  turn  we  write  it  in  dust." 

In  Germany  the  first  tide  of  reformation  was  at  flood  in  the 
year  1520,  when  Luther,  his  thought  having  been  clarified  by 
controversy,  began  to  realize  his  spiritual  kinship  to  Huss  and 
was  forced,  however  reluctantly,  to  the  conclusion  that  even 
an  ecumenical  council  might  err.  In  his  address  to  the  Ger- 
man nobility  he  assailed  the  papal  supremacy  and  speedily 
followed  this  by  a  thorough-going  criticism  of  the .  sacramental 
system  of  the  mediaeval  church,  to  which  he  attributed  her 
various  maladies  and  upon  which  the  papal  supremacy  seemed 
plainly  to  be  based.  He  rejected  all  but  three  of  the  seven 
sacraments  and  repudiated  the  dogma  of  transubstantiation. 

The  German  knights  put  forth  their  last  strength  in  behalf 
of  Luther's  reform,  and  the  union  was  symbolized  by  the 
literary  labors,  the  satires  and  ardent  appeals  of  Ulrich  von 
Hutten,  one  of  their  noblest  representatives.  But  upon  the 
threshold  of  the  third  decade  of  the  century  a  marked  reac- 
tionary sentiment  manifested  itself  and  at  the  Diet  of  Worms 
the  ban  of  the  empire  was  pronounced  against  Luther  and  his 
adherents,  his  writings  were  burnt  and  all  future  dissemination 
of  his  teaching  was  forbidden.  Had  the  decree  been  enforced 


224  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

it  would  have  gone  very  hard  with  him  and  the  cause  —  but  the 
fall  of  Belgrade  into  the  power  of  the  Turks  that  same  year 
created  a  timely  diversion.  In  France  the  reaction  attained 
sufficient  strength  to  drive  d'fitaples  from  the  kingdom  and  to 
wring  a  retractation  from  his  pupil  and  protector,  the  bishop 
Bric.onnet.  In  England  it  was  signalized  by  the  entry  of  the 
king  into  the  lists  of  theological  controversy  ;  by  a  "  Defence 
of  the  Seven  Sacraments  against  Luther "  he  won  from  the 
grateful  Leo  the  title,  "  Defender  of  the  Faith."  In  his  book 
Henry  assumed  perforce  the  position  of  bishop  Pecock  when 
attacking  the  Lollards,  —  namely,  that  much  is  lawful  which  is 
not  expressed  in  Scripture ;  and  in  the  judgment  of  the  reac- 
tionary party  he  achieved  success.  Whatever  the  effect  of  the 
work  may  have  been  upon  the  continent,  for  England  it  was  of 
real  moment,  for  in  it  Henry  put  himself  on  record  as  a  devoted 
Catholic  and  from  that  position  he  never  receded.  Having 
once  assumed  it  all  his  pride,  all  his  obstinacy  of  will,  not  to 
speak  of  his  convictions,  held  him  to  it,  and  through  life  he 
remained  a  consistent  mediaeval  Catholic  in  all  that  concerned 
doctrine,  a  determined  upholder  of  the  dogma  of  transubstan- 
tiation.  So  »ow  for  several  years  reform  languished ;  Colet 
was  dead,  and  the  only  apparent  use  that  Wolsey  made  of  his 
legatine  commission  was  the  suppression  of  a  few  monasteries. 
Henry's  book  and  Luther's  reply  —  in  which  he  handled  his 
royal  opponent  pretty  roughly  —  had  this  important  conse- 
quence, that  a  decisive  breach  was  thereby  effected  between 
the  great  reformer  and  Erasmus.  The  latter  cordially  assented 
to  Henry's  thesis ;  their  relations  were  otherwise  of  the  friend- 
liest; and  Erasmus,  scandalized  by  Luther's  incivility,  now 
came  out  as  a  representative  of  the  reaction.  He  examined 
the  reformer's  writings,  found  the  weak  spot  he  sought  in  his 
doctrine  of  predestination  and  published  a  severe  animadver- 
sion upon  it.  A  truculent  German  monk  named  Murner 
rushed  into  the  fray  in  the  king's  behalf  with  a  book  bearing 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  225 

the  sensational  title,  "Is  the  King  of  England  a  Liar  or  is 
Luther?"  —  and  his  singular  defence  must  have  been  gratify- 
ing to  Henry,  for  he  invited  him  to  visit  England. 

Murner  was  a  universal  satirist,  sparing  no  class,  no  dignity, 
equally  bitter  against  the  hierarchy  of  the  old  church,  the 
monks  and  friars,  and  the  reformers.  Such  general  discontent 
is  indicative  of  some  deep-seated  malady  in  the  social  frame. 
A  like  raucous  note  was  raised  in  England  by  John^  §keltonT 
who  grew  more  abusive  as  he  grew  older  and  the  times  worse. 
In  the  short,  rattling  lines  of  his  "Colin  Clout,"  running  through 
odd  lists  of  rhymes,  he  rails  at  bishops,  priests,  friars,  schoolmen, 
Lollards  and  Lutherans !  His  ire  was  especially  excited  by  the 
unprecedented  grandeur  of  Cardinal  Wolsey,  to  whose  adminis- 
tration he  ascribed  all  the  misfortunes  of  the  reign.  "  Why 
come  ye  not  to  Court  ? "  is  a  ferocious  attack  upon  "  linsey 
Wolsey,  who  rules  all  the  roost  with  bragging  and  boast,  with 
pomp  and  pride  ;  who  nods  and  becks  in  the  Star  Chamber 
and  regards  lords  no  more  than  potsherds,  —  all  the  barons 
fear  the  butcher's  dog."  This  coarse  personal  satire  so  roused 
the  cardinal  that  its  author  had  to  flee  from  his  vengeance  to 
Westminster  sanctuary. 

Skelton  composed  the  best  moral-play  of  the  period  — 
designed  without  doubt  as  a  salutary  warning  to  King  Henry 
VIII.  It  shows  how  Magnificence,  seduced  from  Moderation 
by  Self-Will  and  Craft,  loses  both  Liberty  and  Felicity  and 
becomes  a  prey  to  Adversity,  Poverty  and  Despair;  he  is  saved 
by  Hope,  Redress,  Circumspection  and  Perseverance,  who 
instruct  him  in  genuine  mediaeval  fashion  as  to  the  mutability 
of  things. 

In  "The  Manner  of  the  World  nowadays"  Skelton  probed 
many  a  social  sore  spot  of  the  age.  (He  always  had  a  curious 
taste  for  mortality,  the  grotesque,  and  the  loathsome.)  "  So 
many  good  sermons  and  so  few  devotions  saw  I  never;  so  well 
apparelled  wives  and  so  ill  of  their  lives  —  widows  so  soon  wed 


226  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

after  their  husbands  are  dead,  —  so  proud  and  so  gay,  so  rich 
in  array  and  so  scant  of  money,  saw  I  never;  so  many  places 
untilled,  so  many  beggars,  such  increase  of  thieves,  —  all 
England  decays."  This  pessimistic  outcry  —  in  which  we  catch 
clear  echoes  of  Piers  Plowman  of  old  —  had  only  too  much 
reason  in  the  existing  frame  of  things.  The  kingdom  was  in  a 
deplorable  economic  condition.  The  mediaeval  system  of 
cultivation  —  by  which  a  farm  was  divided  into  three  fields, 
one  growing  wheat,  another  beans  or  peas,  while  the  third  lay 
fallow  —  was  fast  wearing  out.  Food  was  dear  ;  the  prices  of 
wheat,  pork  and  poultry  doubled  during  the  middle  of  the 
reign.  As  the  profit  on  English  wool  was  high  the  passion  for 
sheep-farming  continued  and  was  shared  by  both  spiritual  and 
temporal  lords  ;  lands  were  enclosed,  small  farms  were  blotted 
out  and  holdings  grew  ever  more  extensive.  The  evicted 
tenants  flocked  to  the  towns  where  they  helped  to  swell  the 
pauper  and  criminal  classes.  As  villages  were  deserted  their 
churches  fell  into  disrepair  and  were  used  as  folds  for  the  sheep 
that  pastured  in  the  burial  grounds.  The  whole  Isle  of  Wight 
was  turned  into  a  vast  sheep  run.  In  the  cities  poverty  and 
suffering  were  great  and  general ;  the  streets  were  filthy,  the 
houses  unventilated  and  noisome  ;  the  old-time  guilds  that 
controlled  labor  and  its  materials  were  rapidly  declining,  manu- 
factures decayed,  and  there  were  constant  complaints  of 
trickeries  practised  in  trade  —  of  light  weights,  small  measures 
and  adulterations.  The  divorce  of  ethics  and  economics  was 
as  marked  as  that  of  ethics  and  politics,  or  religion.  And  when 
the  hard  struggle  for  subsistence  was  made  harder  by  heavy 
taxation  and  a  forced  loan  to  build  the  king's  ships  and  carry 
on  his  wars  the  popular  discontent  came  near  exploding  in  an 
armed  insurrection. 

War  had  been  declared  with  France  —  for  the  political  and 
military  corollary  of  the  religious  reaction  was  a  drawing  away 
from  the  French  toward  a  Spanish  alliance.  Of  this  war  there 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  227 

remains  a  literary  memorial  of  worth,  for  the  king,  wishing  to 
kindle  the  enthusiasm  of  his  subjects  by  reviving  the  recollec- 
tion of  the  great  deeds  of  their  forefathers  in  the  glorious  wars 
of  old,  gave  Lord  Berners  as  a  task  the  translation  into  English 
of  Froissart's  Chronicle  —  a  task  which  he  accomplished  with 
much  graphic  power.  The  emperor  attached  Wolsey  to  his 
cause  by  holding  out  to  him  a  golden  lure  —  the  popedom,  — 
in  the  attainment  of  which  summit  of  his  ambition  he  promised 
to  use  all  his  influence  over  the  college  of  cardinals.  Charles 
and  Henry  now  entered  into  a  nefarious  confederacy  to  parti- 
tion France  ;  Henry  was  to  revive  his  obsolete  claims  to  the 
crown  of  that  country  and  in  the  division  was  to  have  its 
western  half.  But  the  emperor  never  intended  to  lend  his 
power  to  the  aggrandizement  of  his  ally's,  and  after  the  terrible 
defeat  of  the  French  at  Pavia  and  the  capture  of  their  king, 
Charles  made  his  own  terms  with  him  in  utter  disregard  of 
Henry  and  let  him  go.  He  had  just  shown  how  lightly  he 
regarded  his  compact  with  Wolsey  by  permitting  a  scion  of  the 
Medici  family  to  be  raised  to  the  papal  chair  as  Clement  VII. 
If  Wolsey  in  his  resentment  now  put  it  into  the  king's  head  (as 
Catherine  always  supposed)  to  offer  a  mortal  insult  to  the 
emperor  by  repudiating  his  queen,  Charles's  aunt,  he  bitterly 
atoned  for  it  later,  for  that  troublous  divorce  was  the  rock  on 
which  all  his  hopes  were  wrecked.  Catherine  was  several  years 
older  than  the  king;  all  their  children  had  died  in  infancy  save 
Mary,  now  a  sickly  child  of  some  ten  summers ;  and  Henry 
interpreted  their  loss  as  a  divine  judgment  upon  him  for  having 
married  his  brother's  widow.  His  longing  was  for  a  male  heir ; 
it  was  impossible  for  men  to  see  clearly  then  how  far  removed 
England  was  from  any  danger  of  a  return  to  the  distressful 
condition  of  the  Wars  of  the  Roses  ;  Henry  really  dreaded 
another  succession  war  and  thought  it  essential  to  his  dynasty 
and  the  welfare  of  the  kingdom  that  he  should  have  a  son,  — 
and  Wolsey  was  commissioned  to  negotiate  a  divorce,  which 


228  OUTLINE   OF  THE  PHILOSOPHY 

implied  a  revocation  of  the  papal  dispensation  for  the  marriage. 
The  matter  —  first  bruited  in  the  year  1526  —  was  a  conse- 
quence of  the  breach  with  the  emperor  already  determined  on. 
Copies  of  William  Tyndale's  version  of  the  New  Testament, 
just  printed  at  Cologne,  were  burnt  in  London  that  year  and  it 
was  forbidden  to  bring  others  into  the  kingdom.  In  Scotland 
a  distinguished  martyr  to  the  reformed  opinions  was  found  in 
the  young  Patrick  Hamilton  —  but  his  death  at  the  stake 
marked  the  culmination  of  the  reaction :  its  force  was  now 
spent  and  combinations  favorable  to  renewed  progress  were 
forming.  In  Germany  the  Lutheran  princes  leagued  together 
and  at  the  Diet  of  Speyer  secured  the  right  of  administering 
religious  affairs  in  their  respective  dominions.  This  result  was 
achieved  through  the  emperor's  alarm  at  a  fresh  irruption  of 
the  Turks;  by  their  terrible  victory  at  Mohacz  the  ancient 
Catholic  kingdom  of  Hungary  was  annihilated  :  the  king  and 
his  principal  lords  fell  on  the  field  of  battle  and  a  famous 
mediaeval  state,  which  had  been  a  bulwark  of  civilization 
against  the  Turks  for  more  than  a  hundred  years,  came  to  an 
end,  losing  its  independence.  The  following  year,  1527,  the 
reformation  was  carried  out  in  Sweden  by  Gustavus  Vasa,  who 
met  the  churchmen  in  diet  at  Westerns  and  bade  them  choose 
between  him  and  the  pope.  Henry  and  Francis,  scandalized 
at  the  sack  of  Rome  by  the  imperial  forces,  consummated  a 
treaty  that  paved  the  way  for  an  onward  march  of  reform  in 
their  dominions.  It  was  of  no  avail  to  Wolsey  that  he  obtained 
a  bull  from  Clement  VII  authorizing  the  suppression  of  some 
more  monasteries  :  that  trifling  measure  could  not  avert  the 
great  catastrophe:  he  could  not  arrange  the  divorce  and  he 
felt  that  he  was  doomed.  As  a  prince  of  the  church  his  lot 
was  cast  with  Rome ;  the  question  lay  between  a  text  in 
Leviticus  and  a  papal  dispensation  which  he  could  not  but 
believe  to  be  valid;  he  did  his  best  to  please  the  king, 
failed,  and  was  banished  from  the  court  Henry  seized  his 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  229 

palace  of  York-place  (Wolsey  had  before  presented  him  with 
his  other  palace  of  Hampton  Court)  and  ordered  him  to  retire 
to  his  archbishopric.  But  his  enemies  were  not  satisfied  with 
his  fall  from  power ;  they  wanted  his  life ;  and  in  the  autumn 
of  1530  they  prevailed  upon  the  king  to  summon  him  to 
London  on  a  charge  of  high  treason.  The  old  cardinal,  broken 
down,  that  is,  in  body  and  spirit,  though  not  old  in  years, 
started  to  obey  the  king's  command  but  was  prostrated  upon 
the  journey;  at  an  abbey  by  the  road  he  took  to  the  bed  from 
which  he  never  rose  again,  —  and  with  him  mediaeval  ecclesi- 
asticism  expired  in  England. 

A  new  set  of  characters  appeared  upon  the  stage :  Thomas 
Cromwell,  formerly  one  of  Wolsey's  servants,  destined  to  be 
for  the  next  ten  years  the  minister  of  the  most  absolute  mon- 
archy that  England  had  ever  known  ;  Thomas  Cranmer,  who 
had  suggested  an  appeal  to  the  universities  of  Europe  concern- 
ing the  divorce  case  and  who  was  shortly  to  be  made  arch- 
bishop upon  the  death  of  Warham ;  and  Anne  Boleyji,  who  had 
some  time  since  supplanted  her  mistress,  Queen  Catherine,  in 
the  king's  affections  and  was  soon  to  replace  her  upon  the 
throne.  Interest  led  her  to  ally  herself  with  the  reformers. 

In  1531  came  the  humiliation  of  the  clergy,  who  were  forced 
to  pay  an  enormous  sum  to  obtain  Henry's  pardon  for  having 
submitted  to  that  legatine  authority  of  Wolsey  which  he  himself 
had  procured.  Convocation,  overawed,  passed  a  resolution 
that  the  king  was  supreme  head  of  the  church  of  England.  In 
1533  he  was  married  to  Anne  Boleyn,  and  Cranmer,  now  arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury,  adjudged  the  marriage  with  Catherine  to 
have  been  invalid.  It  was  a  triumph  of  the  Protestant  prin- 
ciple of  appeal  to  Scripture  as  against  the  authority  of  a  pope. 
The  new  queen  was  now  crowned  with  sumptuous  ceremony 
and  in  September  gave  birth  to  a  daughter  who  was  named 
Elizabeth.  In  1534  the  obsequious  parliament,  echoing  the 
definition  of  the  terrified  convocation,  declared  the  king  su- 


230  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

preme  head  on  earth  of  the  church  of  England.  This  royal 
supremacy  was  precisely  analogous  to  the  principle  lately 
established  at  Speyer. 

While  these  events  were  transpiring  in  England  the  pros- 
pects of  Protestantism  were  brightening  upon  the  continent  as 
well.  The  Augsburg  Confession  was  followed  by  the  League 
of  Schmalcald,  by  which  the  Lutheran  princes  opposed  a  firm 
front  to  the  emperor, — and  in  1532  Suleiman  and  his  Turks 
appeared  before  the  walls  of  Vienna.  Charles  was  compelled 
to  reconcile  himself  to  the  Protestant  princes  and  signed  with 
them  the  religious  peace  of  Nuremberg  by  which  he  granted 
them  free  exercise  of  their  religion  within  their  own  territories. 
A  prosperous  period  ensued :  state  after  state  joined  the 
Protestant  cause,  —  Wiirtemberg  in  1534,  Brandenburg  and 
Saxony  in  1539  :  by  the  latter  year  Bavaria  was  the  solitary 
principality  in  Germany  that  remained  solidly  Catholic. 

In  France  the  reformers  enjoyed  the  sympathy  of  the  king's 
sister,  Margaret,  queen  of  Navarre.  Francis  too  favored  them 
at  first,  willing  to  use  them  as  instruments  against  his  rival  the 
emperor,  but  by  the  year  1535  he  began  to  feel  anxious  at  the 
progress  that  reformed  ideas  were  making  in  his  kingdom; 
some  of  their  representatives  moreover  were  either  fanatical 
or  were  falsely  accused  of  having  posted  some  daring  placards 
that  appeared  upon  the  walls  of  Paris,  even  upon  the  king's 
palace  doors;  several  persons  were  arrested  therefore  and 
burnt  at  the  stake.  And  yet  Francis  concluded  that  year  an 
alliance  with  the  Turkish  sultan,  subordinating  religion  to 
policy.  At  the  same  time  that  he  was  allied  with  the  infidel 
he  was  burning  reformers  in  Paris  and  encouraging  them  in 
Germany. 

News  of  these  martyrdoms  came  to  John  Calvin  in  his  retreat 
at  Basel  and  he  began  forthwith  his  master-work,  the  "  Chris- 
tian Institution,"  in  which  he  regarded  the  whole  circle  of 
Christian  doctrine  from  the  point  of  view  of  justification  by 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  231 

faith:  the  result  was  a  clear,  logical,  severely  systematic 
treatise.  He  composed  it  in  Latin  and  soon  translated  it  into 
French  for  the  benefit  of  a  larger  public.  Luther  had  recently 
completed  his  translation  of  the  Bible  into  German  and  an 
Italian  version  had  appeared  at  Venice,  the  work  of  Brucioli,  a 
capable  Greek  and  Hebrew  scholar.  Cultivation  of  the  popu- 
lar speech  was  everywhere  a  feature  of  the  Reformation. 

The  most  eminent  Hebraist  in  England  was  Robert  Wake- 
field,  for  whom  a  lectureship  in  Hebrew  was  founded  at  Oxford. 
In  1535  the  king  commanded  that  Greek  should  be  taught  in 
all  the  colleges  there,  and  this  definitive  triumph  of  the  new 
learning  was  celebrated  by  the  students  by  a  general  immola- 
tion of  the  works  of  the  schoolmen.  But  Henry  did  to  death 
that  year  the  new  learning's  fairest  representative,  Sir  Thomas 
More.  He  fell  a  sacrifice  to  the  royal  supremacy  in  religious 
matters,  and  the  following  year  the  king  got  Tyndale  burnt  at 
Antwerp  as  a  sacrifice  to  the  mass.  Such  was  the  policy,  as 
tortuous  as  that  of  Francis  I,  by  which  Henry  daunted  his 
subjects. 

The  monasteries  represented  the  ancient  polity  in  an  especial 
manner  and  consequently  the  tide  of  reform  as  it  rose  was 
bound  to  break  about  those  old  institutions ;  with  the  collapse 
of  papal  authority  they  too  were  doomed.  In  1536  Henry 
caused  his  submissive  parliament  to  institute  a  commission  of 
inquiry  into  the  state  of  the  monasteries  and  in  consequence 
of  their  report  nearly  four  hundred  were  suppressed.  In  1537, 
to  make  relic-worship  more  ridiculous,  the  frauds  perpetrated 
at  various  shrines  were  exposed ;  Becket  was  declared  a  traitor, 
his  ashes  were  cast  out,  his  shrine  was  demolished  —  and  two 
great  chests  full  of  jewels  from  it  escheated  to  the  Ipng.  In 
1538  it  was  ordered  that  throughout  England  every  statue  that 
had  been  worshipped  should  be  pulled  down.  And  now  the 
turn  of  the  remaining  and  greater  monasteries  came  —  and  the 
pope,  out  of  all  patience,  published  the  bull  of  excommunication 


232  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

that  he  had  ready  some  years  before  but  had  delayed  at  the 
entreaty  of  Henry's  ally,  the  king  of  France. 

One  who  looks  into  the  literature  of  those  ten  years  must  be 
amazed  to  note  the  awe  approaching  adoration  in  which  the 
English  held  their  king.  He  made,  interpreted  and  executed 
laws  to  suit  himself  ;  parliament  and  bench  were  as  putty  be- 
tween his  fingers;  although  for  form's  sake  he  made  use  of 
his  subservient  parliament  it  came  at  last  to  this,  that  his  procla- 
mations had  the  force  of  law.  He  was  invested  with  the  attri- 
butes of  the  highest  secular  and  ecclesiastical  authority  and  to 
the  majority  of  his  subjects  he  appeared  as  a  kind  of  earthly 
divinity.  Never  has  the  doctrine  of  regal  irresponsibility  been 
more  boldly  expressed  than  by  William  Tyndale,  the  spokesman 
of  that  iconoclastic  decade  :  "  The  king  is  in  this  world  without 
law  and  may  at  his  lust  do  right  or  wrong  and  shall  give  ac- 
count but  to  God  only."  This  apotheosis  of  earthly  sovereignty 
sprang  from  the  thought  of  the  divine,  upon  which  it  was 
grounded,  of  which  it  was  the  visible  analogue.  Tyndale  clear- 
ly reveals  the  connection  :  God  is  absolute,  inscrutable :  we 
may  not  ask  why  he  saves  one  and  not  another ;  "  God  hath 
power  over  all  his  creatures  of  right,  to  do  with  them  what  he 
list;  he  will  be  feared  and  not  have  his  secret  judgments 
known."  And  God  rules  the  world  through  kings :  "  he  that 
resisteth  the  king  resisteth  God  "  ;  even  an  evil  king  is  a  bene- 
fit of  God,  for  "  it  is  better  to  suffer  one  tyrant  than  many." 
Such  is  the  passive  "  Obedience  of  a  Christian  Man  "  incul- 
cated by  this  Protestant  Macchiavelli,  and  his  defence  is  that 
only  so  could  the  yoke  of  Rome  be  broken. 

In  Tyndale  the  English  Protestant  appears  in  plain  colors. 
He  was  a  disciple  of  Colet  but  his  radicalism  registers  the  rise 
of  the  tide  of  reform  far  above  the  limits  his  master  would  have 
assigned.  He  disparaged  sacraments,  ceremonies,  consecrated 
buildings  ;  of  the  first  he  rejected  all  but  two,  baptism  and  the 
Lord's  supper — and  the  latter  he  defined  as  a  memorial  of 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  233 

Christ's  everlasting  sacrifice  but  not  itself  a  sacrifice.  Confir- 
mation he  declared  to  be  "a  dumb  ceremony  "  reserved  by 
bishops  to  increase  their  power  —  but  "the  wagging  of  a 
bishop's  hand  is  not  blessing."  In  like  manner  he  ridiculed 
auricular  confession,  pilgrimage,  saint-worship  and  priestly 
celibacy.  The  spirit  that  razed  Gothic  shrines  and  shattered 
statues  comes  to  light  in  his  dictum,  God  is  in  all  places  alike : 
what  careth  he  for  the  temple  ?  "  The  temple  wherein  God 
will  be  worshipped  is  the  heart  of  man  "  and  no  place  is  holier 
than  any  other.  God's  absoluteness,  man's  nothingness  were 
the  poles  of  his  thought.  Original  sin  he  defined  as  birth 
poison  remaining  in  all  men  in  this  life ;  the  freedom  of  the 
will  and  the  gospel  of  works  seemed  to  him  the  most  odious 
heresy.  "That  faith  only  before  all  works  and  without  all 
merits  but  Christ's  only  justifieth,  is  proved  by  Paul";  that 
the  outward  deed  justifies  and  makes  holy  is  the  error  of  "the 
pope's  sect."  He  vindicated  his  translation  of  the  Bible ;  the 
papists,  to  quench  the  light,  call  it  impossible,  unlawful,  hereti- 
cal to  translate  the  scriptures  —  but  "will  ye  resist  God? 
Hath  he  not  made  the  English  tongue  ?  Why  forbid  ye  him 
to  speak  in  the  English  tongue  then  as  well  as  in  the  Latin  ? " 
He  charged  his  opponents  with  wresting  Holy  Scripture  from 
its  plain  meaning  by  their  doctrine  of  multiple  senses  and  alle- 
gorical interpretation,  whereas  "  it  hath  but  one  simple,  literal 
sense,"  —  and  brushed  aside  the  old  and  common  argument 
about  its  difficulty:  "a  man  without  the  spirit  of  Aristotle  may 
by  the  Spirit  of  God  understand  Scripture."  His  fling  at  the 
light  literature  of  the  day  is  characteristic,  Puritanic:  "the  priests 
permit  the  reading  of  Robin  Hood,  Bevis  of  Hampton,  Hercules, 
Hector  and  Troilus,  with  a  thousand  histories  and  fables  of 
love  and  wantonness  and  of  ribaldry  as  filthy  as  heart  can 
think,  to  corrupt  the  minds  of  youth  withal,  clean  contrary  to 
the  doctrine  of  Christ  and  his  apostles."  He  magnified  preach- 
ing as  the  great  duty  of  churchmen  and  defended  it  from  the 


234  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

charge  that  it  was  accountable  for  grave  public  disorders :  not 
preaching  the  gospel  but  the  evil  life  of  ecclesiastics  causes  dis- 
obedience and  insurrection.  Wyclif  is  justified  :  "  he  preached 
repentance  unto  our  fathers  not  long  since,  and  they  repented 
not.  What  followed  ?  —  the  French  and  civil  wars  that  made 
the  land  a  wilderness."  Such  was  his  prophetic  philosophy  of 
history.  His  practical  teaching  is  of  interest.  He  sought  to 
recall  the  daily  and  economic  life  of  man  to  its  moral  and 
religious  basis :  "  Let  every  man  of  whatsoever  craft,  whether 
brewer,  baker,  tailor,  victualler,  merchant  or  husbandman  serve 
his  brethren  as  he  would  do  Christ  himself,  and  so  his  occupa- 
tion pleaseth  God."  All  occupations,  either  washing  of  dishes 
or  preaching  the  word,  are  alike  if  done  with  the  spirit  of  God. 
His  teaching  concerning  the  family  is  marked  by  a  curious 
contradiction  :  all  generation,  all  life  is  of  God,  he  says,  — 
and  in  the  next  breath  bids  children  remember  that  they  are 
their  parents'  good  and  possession  (a  piece  of  bad  logic  from 
which  has  ever  sprung  most  of  the  misery  of  the  world).  A 
child  should  dread  its  parents  —  for  "when  they  are  angry 
with  thee  God  is  angry  with  thee  and  his  vengeance  will  not 
depart  from  the  disobedient  till  they  be  murdered,  drowned  or 
hanged.  The  marriage  of  children  pertaineth  unto  their  elders  " 
by  the  fifth  commandment  —  a  truism  then,  yet  one  to  which 
all  romance  gives  the  lie.  "The  husband  is  to  the  wife  in 
God's  stead"  and  the  master  to  the  servant:  "his  command- 
ments are  God's."  All  heads  up  therefore  in  marital  and 
paternal  absolutism  —  the  analogue  in  the  family  to  the  regal 
in  the  state  and  the  divine  in  heaven.  By  a  contradiction 
similar  to  the  above  Tyndale  bids  his  autocratic  king  remember 
that  the  people  are  God's  and  not  his. 

Thomas  Starkey,  sometime  Henry's  chaplain  and  intermedi- 
ary between  him  and  his  relative,  Reginald  Pole,  reflects 
the  king-worship  of  the  hour.  He  wrote  an  apology  for  the 
royal  supremacy  and  the  king's  second  marriage  —  for  in 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  235 

saying  "  My  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world  "  Christ  designed  to 
leave  all  such  things  to  the  governance  of  man  and  worldly 
policy !  This  exegesis  did  not  convince  Pole ;  he  sent  his 
kinsman  an  insulting  book  upon  the  points  in  dispute,  identi- 
fied his  interest  with  that  of  the  papacy,  visited  Rome  and  was 
raised  to  the  cardinalate.  It  was  a  terrible  blow  to  his  agent 
Starkey,  to  whom  it  was  "great  grief  if  the  king  should  not  be 
good  lord  to  him  and  gracious."  His  disgrace  begot  in  him  a 
"contempt  for  this  life  and  its  vain  pleasures."  To  recover 
favor  he  wrote  and  dedicated  to  Henry  an  imaginary  but 
instructive  "  Dialogue "  between  Pole  and  a  royalist  named 
Thomas  Lupset,  one  of  Colet's  pupils.  It  treats  in  an  interest- 
ing manner  of  the  origin  of  civil  life  and  of  existing  economic 
evils.  Pole,  it  would  appear,  was  a  determinist  in  his  psychol- 
ogy :  "  the  mind  of  man  first  of  itself  is  as  a  clean  and  pure 
table  " —  and  will  is  as  opinion  is.  He  advances  the  anarchic 
postulate  that  for  years  men  lived  without  a  prince  or  a  common 
council  and  that  life  was  then  more  virtuous,  more  accordant 
with  the  dignity  of  human  nature  than  it  is  under  the  existing 
social  order.  He  prefers  a  country  to  a  city  life  —  "I  had 
rather  live  in  the  wild  forest."  Lupset  replies  that  civil  life  is 
grounded  in  man's  better  nature  and  is  therefore  truly  natural ; 
that  cities  are  "  stars  upon  earth  "  and  that  instead  of  abandon- 
ing them  and  returning  to  barbarism  one  should  study  how  to 
remove  their  imperfections.  Pole  declares  for  elective  mon- 
archy :  Lupset  regards  hereditary  succession  as  a  safeguard 
against  civil  war.  The  prince  is  the  heart  of  the  social  order ; 
from  the  heart  all  life  and  wisdom  spring ;  and  now  is  the  time 
to  labor  for  the  state  while  we  have  "  so  noble  a  prince  ;  never 
prince  had  more  fervent  love  to  the  wealth  of  his  subjects  than 
hath  he."  True,  in  a  sense  not  intended  ! 

Starkey  had  a  relish  for  proverbial  philosophy :  "  Matters 
be  ended  as  they  be  friended ;  many  eyes  see  better  than  one ; 
it  is  easier  to  spy  two  faults  than  amend  one ;  he  was  never 


236  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

good  master  that  never  was  scholar,  nor  never  good  captain 
that  never  was  soldier,"  are  some  of  the  sayings  embodied  in 
the  dialogue. 

With  so  excellent  a  prince  it  is  a  marvel  that  the  condition 
of  society  continued  as  bad  as  ever !  Both  disputants  agree 
that  England  is  in  a  bad  way ;  castles  and  towns  are  dilapi- 
dated, lands  lie  waste,  poverty  is  increasing  and  population 
declines  while  beggars  grow  more  numerous.  This  gloomy 
picture  is  corroborated  by  Elyot :  "  What  an  infinite  number 
of  English  men  and  women  at  this  present  time  wander  in  all 
places  throughout  this  realm  as  beasts  brute  and  savage 
abandoning  all  occupation,  service  and  honesty !  "  Starkey 
complains  of  the  oppressive  number  of  priests,  canons,  monks 
and  friars ;  lawyers,  those  '  cormorants,'  are  out  of  all  propor- 
tion to  the  number  of  artisans  and  farmers ;  bishops  care  only 
for  the  wool  of  their  flock  and  ape  the  secular  lords ;  common- 
ers too  seek  to  imitate  lords  in  their  expense  and  show.  The 
conclusion  arrived  at  is  that  a  remedy  for  these  ills  is  to  be 
sought  in  encouraging  marriage :  priests  should  be  allowed  to 
marry,  bachelors  should  be  well  taxed  and  poor  men  with  five 
children  exempted  from  taxation.  For  the  due  repair  of  decay- 
ing towns  and  the  health  of  the  citizens  the  old  office  of  edile 
should  be  revived.  The  general  idleness  might  be  corrected 
by  instruction  in  manual  arts  and  more  and  better  schools 
should  be  established. 

The  earnest  mind  of  Sir-Thoirias_Elyot  was  equally  exercised 
over  the  political  situation  and  he  preceded  Starkey  in  sug- 
gesting a  better  method  of  education  as  a  specific.  He  was 
one  of  the  most  learned  men  of  the  reign,  an  ardent  friend 
and  admirer  of  More's  and  a  servant  of  the  king  on  diplomatic 
embassies.  In  1531  appeared  his  "  Governor  " — an  ideal  of 
culture  for  an  English  youth  destined  to  public  office.  From 
the  unity  of  the  supreme  ruler  Elyot,  like  Tyndale,  derives  his 
correspondent  earthly  monarchy :  aristocracy  and  democracy, 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  237 

he  avers,  are  ever  subject  to  division  and  discord  :  by  examples 
drawn  from  Scripture  and  the  experience  of  Greece,  Rome 
and  several  Italian  states  he  unfolds  his  philosophy  of  history. 
In  a  single  sentence  he  couches  the  apology  of  that  revolu- 
tionary decade  :  "  From  God  only  proceedeth  all  honor  and 
neither  noble  progeny,  succession  nor  election  be  of  such 
force  that  by  them  any  estate  or  dignity  may  be  so  established 
that  God  being  stirred  to  vengeance  shall  not  shortly  resume 
it  and  perchance  translate  it  where  it  shall  like  him." 

The  "  education  of  a  gentleman  "  who  is  to  serve  his  king 
as  a  lesser  "  governor  "  or  magistrate  should  begin  in  infancy. 
He  should  hear  no  coarse  word  but  only  pure  English  and 
Latin,  which  may  be  made  familiar  to  him  from  his  earliest 
years.  The  refining  influence  of  music  is  not  to  be  forgotten ; 
it  is  a  solace  and  a  pleasant  science  and  was  so  regarded  by 
the  ancients.  If  the  child  is  inclined  to  paint  or  form  images 
in  stone  or  "tree,"  he  should  be  encouraged  —  contempt  of 
art  and  artists  suppresses  genius  and  so  we  have  to  apply  to 
strangers  when  we  would  have  anything  painted  or  carved. 
The  boy's  tutor  should  be  selected  with  care,  for  an  ignorant 
and  cruel  master  dulls  wits  as  daily  experience  shows. 
(Children  suffered  untold  misery  at  their  teachers'  hands  in 
those  days.)  While  learning  Greek  the  little  student  is  to  con- 
verse in  Latin,  —  and  he  should  begin  to  read  authors  before 
he  gets  wearied  of  the  grammar,  which  should  serve  simply  as 
an  introduction  to  literature.  It  is  good  to  commit  to  memory 
and  to  practise  verse-composition.  At  fourteen  years  the  lad 
should  have  read  Homer  and  Virgil,  Ovid,  Horace,  Lucan, 
Hesiod  and  selections  from  other  classics ;  he  may  then  take 
up  logic  and  rhetoric,  and  geography  as  a  preparation  for 
history  which,  with  poetry,  stimulates  courage.  Elyot  defends 
poetry ;  much  may  be  learned,  he  says,  even  from  comedies. 
At  seventeen  years  the  youth  should  learn  to  restrain  his  ardor 
by  reason  and  philosophy  —  especially  that  branch  called 


238  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

moral:  now  he  may  study  Aristotle,  Cicero  and  above  all 
Plato.  To  make  the  physical  frame  strong  and  supple,  wrest- 
ling and  running  are  recommended  by  the  example  of  the 
ancients ;  swimming  is  good  though  it  be  not  of  much  repute 
now ;  sword-play  and  battle-axe  afford  good  exercise,  hunting 
and  hawking  give  one  an  appetite  for  supper.  "All  dancing 
is  not  repugnant  unto  virtue  ";  it  may  be  a  noble  and  virtuous 
pastime  and  should  be  turned  to  account  in  gentle  education. 
The  mixed  dance  signifies  matrimony — and  that  is  a  sacra- 
ment. Among  other  amusements  and  exercises  Elyot  dissuades 
from  dice  as  an  invention  of  the  devil ;  cards  are  not  so  bad 
but  chess  is  best  of  all.  "  Shooting  with  the  bow  "  is  highly 
commended,  but  ten-pins,  quoit-throwing  and  foot-ball  are 
proscribed  —  the  last  because  of  the  "beastly  fury  and  vio- 
lence "  it  excites  and  the  danger  of  strain  incurred. 

So  far  the  training  of  the  youth ;  the  second  part  of  the 
work  treats  of  the  virtues  which  one  in  authority  should  prac- 
tise, of  his  apparel  and  his  dwelling.  He  should  be  affable, 
benevolent,  liberal.  A  forcible  sentence  dissuades  from  anger 
—  that  hideous  passion :  "  who,  beholding  a  man  by  fury 
changed  into  an  horrible  figure,  his  face  infarced  [swollen] 
with  rancor,  his  mouth  foul  and  imbossed  [frothy],  his  eyne 
wide  staring,  not  speaking,  but  as  a  wild  bull  roaring  and 
braying  out  words  despiteful  and  venomous,  forgetting  his 
estate  or  condition,  forgetting  learning,  yea,  forgetting  all 
reason,  will  not  have  such  a  passion  in  extreme  detestation  ?  " 
(Such  a  spectacle,  one  might  suppose,  should  cure  the  beholder 
and  the  shame  consequent  on  the  exhibition  the  offender  of 
any  disposition  to  fly  into  a  like  rage  or  commit  a  repetition  of 
such  a  scene.) 

A  magistrate's  house  should  have  its  walls  adorned  with 
arras,  painted  panels  and  figures  representing  famous  deeds 
and  persons,  and  the  board  should  be  set  out  with  plate  and 
vessels  engraved  with  histories  or  wise  sentences.  The  duty 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  239 

of  decorating  churches  inspired  what  is  perhaps  the  most  glow- 
ing sentence  in  the  work ;  "  These  material  churches  where- 
unto  repaireth  the  congregation  of  Christian  people,  in  the 
which  is  the  corporal  presence  of  the  Son  of  God  and  very  God, 
ought  to  be  pure,  clean  and  well  adorned,  as  the  heaven  visible 
is  most  pleasantly  garnished  with  planets  and  stars  resplen- 
dishing  in  the  most  pure  firmament  of  azure  color." 

Eljot  was  the  type  of  a  cultivated,  Catholic  humanist  of  the 
latter  half  of  the  reign  of  Henry  VIII.  He  was  overpowered 
by  the  wealth  and  authority  of  classic  literature ;  among  his 
numberless  examples  drawn  therefrom,  his  constant  reference 
to  ancient  authors,  we  long  for  more  nervous,  original  thought. 
He  remains  nevertheless  (perhaps  we  ought  to  say  therefore) 
a  typical  Englishman  of  the  Renascence. 

At  the  court  John  Heywood  made  merriment  by  his  witty 
talk  and  song,  epigrams  and  light  dramatic  pieces.  He  had 
been  recommended  by  Sir  Thomas  More  to  the  young  princess 
Mary.  In  his  dialogue  of  "The  Pardoner  and  the  Friar" 
written  before  the  breach  with  Rome  we  are  transported  even 
to  Chaucer's  day  ;  the  atmosphere  is  still  mediaeval.  The 
two  sinners  strive  to  outdo  each  other  in  popular  favor ;  the 
pardoner  vaunts  his  power  to  absolve  from  every  sin  and  the 
miraculous  efficacy  of  his  relics,  while  the  friar  celebrates  the 
good  deeds  of  his  order ;  they  preach  at  each  other  in  alternate 
lines,  work  themselves  into  a  passion  and  finally  come  to 
blows.  In  "  John  the  Husband,  Tyb  the  Wife,  and  Sir  John 
the  Priest "  the  woes  of  a  henpecked  husband  are  set  forth, 
the  ill  usage  he  sustains  at  the  hands  of  a  faithless  wife  and 
a  profligate  priest,  —  but  the  brightest  of  Heywood's  pieces  is 
"  The  Four  P's."  A  palmer,  a  pardoner,  a  'pothecary  and  a 
pedlar  rival  each  other  in  telling  monstrous  stories  :  at  the  last 
the  palmer  avers  that  he  never  saw  a  woman  out  of  patience  in 
his  life  :  the  others,  agape,  profess  that  he  has  won,  for  that  is 
the  greatest  lie  of  all. 


240  OUTLINE   OF  THE  PHILOSOPHY 

John  Bale,  a  zealous  partisan  of  the  Reformation,  composed 
mysteries  and  interludes,  —  but  for  the  best  dramatic  relic  of 
the  day  —  the  best  morality,  perhaps,  ever  written  in  Britain  — 
we  have  to  cross  once  more  the  Scottish  border.  Owing  to  the 
treaty  with  France  there  was  relative  peace  between  England 
and  Scotland,  and  at  the  court  of  the  young  king,  James  V, 
we  discern  a  transient  blush  of  letters  and  arts,  a  touch  of 
renascent  scholarship,  a  freedom  of  thought  and  speech,  a 
moment  of  gayety  that  recall  the  palmier  time  before  Flodden. 
Among  the  scholars  at  the  court  was  John  Bellenden,  whose 
version  of  Boece's  Latin  history  of  Scotland  so  pleased  the 
king  that  he  commissioned  him  to  turn  the  work  of  Livy 
into  the  popular  dialect.  In  1537  James  concluded  a  romantic 
courtship  by  bringing  home  from  France  the  delicate  young 
princess  Madeleine  as  his  bride  —  and  in  her  train  there  came 
a  page  named  Pierre  Ronsard.  The  poor  girl  lived  only  a 
few  weeks  after  her  arrival  in  the  north,  dying  before  she  could 
be  crowned  —  and  Sir  David  Lindsay  gave  expression  to  the 
general  sorrow  in  a  poetical  lament.  He  had  been  the  king's 
preceptor  and  it  was  he  who  wrote  the  moral-play  mentioned 
above.  It  is  entitled  "A  pleasant  Satire  of  the  Three  Estates" 

—  the  spiritual  and  temporal  lords,  that  is,  and  the  burgesses 

—  but  the  first  of  these  had  to  bear  the  brunt  of  the  satire 
which  can  hardly  have  been  "  pleasant "  to  them  :  and  the  first 
part  of  the  play  was   designed  as  a  lesson  for  the  king  —  a 
warning  and  rebuke  of  his  sensual  propensities.    King  Humanity 
desires  to  rule  his  realm  well  but  is  tempted  by  Wantonness  to 
yield  to  Sensuality  ;  good  Counsel  comes  to  recover  him,  to  the 
alarm  of  Flattery  and  Falsehood,  who  disguise  themselves  as 
friars,  change  their  names  to   Devotion   and  Wisdom,  beguile 
the  king  and  drive  Counsel  away.     Now  Truth  appears  —  and 
is  accused  to  the  bishops  of  having  an  English  Testament  in  her 
hand:  an  abbot  advises  a  charge  of  heresy  and  summary  ban- 
ishment, but  for  the  present  she  is  put  in  the  stocks.     Chastity 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  241 

next  seeks  to  save  the  king  but  Sensuality  bids  him  choose 
between  them  and  he  banishes  Chastity  on  pain  of  death.  But 
now  Correction  who  has  been  reforming  the  rest  of  Christen- 
dom arrives  in  Scotland:  Flattery  robs  the  king  and  runs  away: 
Correction  looses  and  recalls  Counsel,  Truth  and  Chastity  and 
drives  away  Sensuality  who  takes  refuge  with  the  bishops  and 
abbots. 

The  play  was  enacted  before  the  court  at  Linlithgow  palace 
in  the  year  1540.  Lindsay  used  a  plainness  of  speech  that  is 
an  extraordinary  revelation  of  the  manners  of  the  day.  It 
speaks  well  for  the  king  that  he  took  his  old  tutor's  remon- 
strances in  good  part:  and  without  his  protection  Lindsay 
could  hardly  have  ventured  upon  such  bold  criticism  of  the 
higher  clergy.  He  illumines  for  us  the  ghastly  abyss  of  corrup- 
tion the  surface  of  which  the  common  histories  skim  with 
euphemistic,  deceptive  propriety.  The  gross  sensuality  of  the 
decaying  church  is  his  dominant  theme :  "  the  Roman  church 
is  the  lamp  of  lechery  :  the  cardinals  and  bishops  have  banished 
chastity  from  Rome.  Most  of  the  prelates  of  this  nation  have 
concubines  —  some  have  three.  The  marriage  of  the  clergy  is 
criminal,  is  irksome,  but  a  change  of  concubines  innocent  and 
pleasant."  And  the  biting  satire  was  irrefutable,  so  extreme 
was  the  moral  dissolution  finally  induced  by  monastic  restraint 
upon  natural  instinct  and  a  canonical  impediment  to  a  lawful 
connection.  And  his  clerical  associates,  counsellors  and  con- 
science-keepers connived  at  if  they  did  not  actually  encourage 
the  young  king  in  his  loose  way  of  life.  Such  were  the  morals 
of  the  parties  that  combined  to  suppress  the  reformation  in 
Scotland  —  and  the  corruption  and  tyranny  of  the  Scottish 
episcopate  is  the  sufficient  explanation  of  the  force  that  presby- 
terianism  there  acquired. 

In  the  latter  part  of  the  satire  which  recounts  the  oppres- 
sion of  John  Commonweal  whose  money  is  drained  Romeward 
occur  some  quaint  touches:  a  pardoner  just  from  Rome  finds 


242  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

his  traffic  diminishing  and  curses  the  New  Testament,  Luther 
and  St.  Paul  as  the  cause ;  and  the  spiritual  lords  agree  that 
"it  had  been  good  that  Paul  had  ne'er  been  born!  " 

Among  Lindsay's  shorter  poems  is  a  remorseless  exposure 
of  the  immoral  suggestions  of  the  confessional  and  the  frivolous 
and  mercenary  nature  of  the  penances  prescribed.  In  his 
"  Answer  to  the  King's  Flyting "  he  scores  his  royal  pupil's 
profligacy  in  downright  terms.  In  other  coarse  but  clever 
verses  he  ridicules  a  passing  fashion  in  ladies'  dress  and  his 
"  Justing  between  Watson  and  Barbour "  is  a  satire  with  a 
double  edge  ;  it  is  a  lampoon  upon  the  professors  of  medicine 
and  a  Rabelaisian  caricature  of  the  courtly  entertainment  of 
the  tournament  —  and  when  a  once  honored  institution  becomes 
a  subject  for  jest  and  burlesque  its  end  is  near. 

The  best  known  by  far,  the  most  read  and  loved  to-day  of 
all  the  writers  of  the  reign  of  Henry  VIII  are  the  poet  friends 
Wyatt  and  Surrey ;  to  them  belongs  the  credit  of  having  intro- 
duced the  sonnet  and  blank  verse  into  English  literature. 
Wyatt  was  of  the  more  masculine  genius.  Of  his  sonnets  the 
octave  is  correct,  Petrarchian  ;  the  sestet  is  composed  of  an 
ordinary  or  inverted  quatrain  and  a  couplet.  In  one  experj- 
ment  there  are  only  three  rhymes,  two  running  alternately 
through  twelve  lines,  the  third  forming  the  terminal  couplet. 
He  also  composed  rondeaux,  songs,  epigrams  etc.  in  a  single 
Chaucerian  stanza  or  Boccaccian  octave,  and  satires  in  the 
rhyming  system  of  Dante's  Divine  Comedy.  So  deeply  was 
his  genius  swayed  by  Italian  influence,  though  French  too  was 
not  wanting.  His  verse  is  analytical,  reflective,  —  its  subject 
is  the  passion  of  love.  One  pretty  sonnet  —  the  crystalline 
form  is  singularly  adapted  to  contain  distilled  emotion  —  tells 
of  the  signs  of  love ;  another,  of  a  dream  that  he  had  his  love 
in  possession ;  another  describes  the  lover's  woful  state,  now 
freezing,  now  burning  —  his  life  is  compared  to  a  ship  tossed 
at  sea  and  again  to  the  Alps.  There  is  scant  observation  of 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  243 

external  nature  in  these  poems:  love  is  compared  to  a  tiger,  a 
stream,  fire,  wind,  the  sea,  —  but  there  is  no  landscape,  no 
picture;  external  objects  are  introduced  in  a  frigid,  merely 
decorative  way.  He  complains  of  his  mistress'  cruelty  and 
his  own  lack  of  liberty ;  yet  again  though  beloved  by  her  he 
loves  he  suffers  still  and  makes  the  discovery  that  there  is 
pain  even  in  love's  fruition.  He  continues  to  analyze  his 
feelings,  his  doubts:  "by  love  hell  may  be  felt  ere  death 
assail."  (Perhaps  it  was  in  this  mood  that  he  took  to  trans- 
lating the  seven  penitential  psalms  !)  At  last  by  an  effort  of 
will  he  breaks  his  bonds  and  adopts  a  manlier  strain,  rejoicing 
that  he  has  regained  his  freedom,  having  broken  the  snares  of 
love  like  a  bird. 

His  satires  are  in  similar  vein  :  he  exults  that  he  has  escaped 
from  the  court  where  speech  is  not  free,  where  one  must  speak 
fair  to  wealth  and  rank,  where  life  is  no  life  but  flattery  and 
slavery:  now  he  is  free  "in  Kent  and  Christendom,"  —  and 
there  he  invites  a  friend  to  join  him. 

He  sums  up  his  experience  of  life  for  his  young  reader's : 

"  If  thou  wilt  mighty  be  flee  from  the  rage 
Of  cruel  will  and  see  thou  keep  thee  free 
From  the  foul  yoke  of  sensual  bondage  .  .  . 
For  He  that  hath  each  star  in  heaven  fixed  .  .  . 
Alike  hath  made  thee  noble  in  his  working, 
So  that  wretched  no  way  may  thou  be 
Except  foul  lust  and  vice  do  conquer  thee." 

Stars  and  the  moral  law !  They  are  a  young  man's  poems, 
self-conscious,  introspective,  aspiring ;  in  them  we  perceive  the 
soul  turning  in  upon  itself,  studying  its  own  workings ;  here  is 
the  personal  element,  self-analysis,  contrast  of  outer  and  inner, 
—  the  note  is  distinctly  modern,  —  the  age  is  growing  meta- 
physical, psychological,  ethical. 

Nature  enters  largely  into  Surrey's  sonnets ;  one  of  them  is 
a  pretty  description  of  spring  —  and  in  truth  his  was  the  spring- 


244  OUTLINE   OF  THE   PHILOSOPHY 

time  of  modern  poetry.     "  The  sun,  when  he  hath  spread  his 
rays  "  reveals  a  wide  landscape  : 

"  The  mountains  high  and  how  they  stand, 
The  valleys  and  the  great  mainland, 
The  trees,  the  herbs,  the  towers  strong, 
The  castles  and  the  rivers  long." 

Roaming  about  the  streets  of  London  one  night  with  frolic- 
some companions,  Surrey  broke  the  big  glass  windows  of  some 
of  the  staid  citizens  —  and  was  speedily  lodged  in  the  Fleet 
prison  ;  but  there,  instead  of  using  the  time  for  repentance,  he 
penned  a  satire  upon  the  city,  the  modern  Babylon,  and  the 
vices  of  its  inhabitants,  —  whose  windows  he  broke  to  mind 
them  of  God's  judgment  ! 

He  wrote  many  quatrains,  versified  several  chapters  of  the 
book  Ecclesiastes  and  several  psalms  —  but  his  chief  contri- 
bution to  his  country's  literature  was  a  translation  of  the  second 
and  fourth  books  of  the  ^Eneid  in  blank  verse.  We  note  that 
his  caesura  usually  falls  after  the  fourth  syllable  —  the  second 
foot,  —  rarely  after  the  fifth ;  on  an  average  one  line  in  seven 
begins  with  an  accented  syllable ;  an  alexandrine  sometimes 
intrudes  itself ;  and  the  lines,  of  which  only  one  in  six  runs  on 
into  the  following,  never  end  with  a  redundant  syllable.  So 
formal  and  mechanical  at  its  introduction  was  that  most  plastic 
and  ductile  form  of  verse. 

It  is  interesting  to  learn  that  at  this  very  epoch  the  sonnet 
was  introduced  into  French  literature  by  Mellin  de  Saint  Gelais. 
The  fashion  of  psalm-translating  was  exemplified  with  eminent 
success  by  Clement  Marot  —  a  prote'ge  of  the  queen  of  Na- 
varre. He  was  an  expert  beside  of  polished  taste  in  all  kinds 
of  mediaeval  measures.  His  version  of  the  psalms  was  widely 
popular  and  for  thus  abetting  the  religious  movement  and  for 
his  liberal  opinions  he  was  forced  to  flee  into  Italy.  Another 
of  Margaret's  protege's  —  Bonaventure  des  PeViers  —  was  a 
satirist  of  all  religions :  he  was  no  doubt  a  collaborator  with 


- 

OF  ENGLISH 


his  royal  patroness  in  her  famous  Heptameron  or  "  tales  of 
the  seven  days  "  with  which  a  supposed  party  of  fashionable 
visitors  to  the  springs  of  Cauteretz  beguiled  an  enforced  delay 
on  their  return.  Genuine  mediaeval  license  marks  many  of 
their  tales. 

The  traits  just  slightly  touched  on  are  sufficient  to  indicate 
the  fatal  weakness  in  faith  and  morals  by  reason  of  which  the 
French  after  many  noble  efforts  surrendered  themselves  to  the 
remodelled  church  of  Rome.  Deeply  significant  in  this  regard 
is  the  huge  satire,  the  grotesque  allegory,  "  Gargantua  and 
Pantagruel  "  —  the  chief  literary  landmark  of  that  time,  and 
a  cloaca,  as  it  would  seem,  for  all  the  ordure  of  the  Middle 
Ages.  Rabelais  has  ever  been  a  problematical  character  ;  he 
was  a  monk,  but  a  monk  out  of  his  cloister,  a  student  of  medi- 
cine and  of  the  new  learning  ;  he  was  sincere  in  his  uncouth 
satire  upon  the  monastic  and  scholastic  systems  and  for  the 
latter  he  propounded  a  natural  and  sensible  substitute,  —  yet 
he  was  not  a  Protestant,  hardly  a  man  of  the  Renascence  ;  his 
eye  was  fixed  upon  the  animal  part  of  our  nature  and  though 
he  had  glimpses  of  higher  things  he  contented  himself  with 
mockery.  So  it  was  with  his  countrymen  :  France  laughed 
with  Rabelais  and  abandoned  the  ideal. 

Sonnets  had  been  written  in  Spanish,  it  will  be  remembered, 
long  since,  but  the  form  was  now  fairly  naturalized  in  Castilian 
literature  by  the  poetic  pair  Juan  Boscan  and  Garcilasso  de  la 
Vega,  who  afford  a  pleasing  and  forcible  comparison  with  their 
English  contemporaries  Wyatt  and  Surrey.  Their  sonnets  are 
tuned  to  the  same  pure  and  meditative  strain  and  the  young 
Garcilasso's  are  of  even  superior  grace.  They  also  experi- 
mented with  blank  verse,  Boscan  in  a  long  tale,  his  friend  in  a 
poetic  epistle.  Boscan's  best  production  is  an  allegory  of  love 
in  Boccaccio's  octave. 

A  sample  of  Spanish  prose  and  of  the  politico-didactic 
interest  of  the  period  is  the  "  Dial  of  Princes  "  by  Antonio  de 


246  OUTLINE    OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

Guevara,  historiographer  to  the  emperor  Charles  V.  It  was 
widely  read  and  translated.  And  a  class  of  writings  character- 
istic of  Spanish  literature,  thence  imported  and  made  popular 
in  many  languages,  was  headed  by  Diego  de  Mendoza  with  his 
comic  history,  written  during  his  student  days  at  Salamanca,  of 
the  clever  rogue  and  lackey,  "  Lazarillo  de  Tormes." 

An  interesting  literary  reaction  against  the  late  poetic  move- 
ment under  Italian  tutelage  was  led  by  Christoval  de  Castillejo 
from  about  the  year  1540.  He  advocated  with  all  his  might  a 
return  to  old-time  modes  of  verse. 

The  date  is  memorable  for  it  was  signalized  by  a  strenuous 
ecclesiastical  reaction  whose  capital  expression  was  the  institu- 
tion of  the  Jesuit  order.  In  1541  the  conciliatory  conference 
at  Regensburg  in  which  a  basis  of  agreement  was  sought  for 
both  Catholics  and  Protestants  broke  up  in  failure.  In  1543 
a  Spanish  Testament  was  suppressed  and  the  Inquisition  was 
introduced  into  Italy ;  the  following  year  a  Spaniard  was  burnt 
for  Lutheran  heresy  ;  and  in  1545  the  great  reactionary  Coun- 
cil of  Trent  was  convened.  Its  objects  were  a  reformation  of 
the  church  and  suppression  of  heresy  —  but  the  former  point 
though  pressed  by  the  French  bishops  was  by  Spanish  and 
Italian  influence  postponed  to  the  latter,  and  the  decrees  on 
the  Scriptures  and  justification  were  carefully  worded  so  as  to 
exclude  the  reformers'  views.  The  Roman  church  had  at  last 
awakened  to  the  necessity  of  repressive  measures  and  disci- 
plinary reform  if  it  would  save  itself  from  dissolution  —  and 
that  awakening  connotes  the  close  of  mediaevalism  proper  in 
southern  Europe  and  the  collapse  of  Italian  humanism.  The 
sack  of  Rome  had  scattered  the  humanists  thence,  Medicean 
tyranny  had  exiled  others  from  Florence  and  numbers  of 
scholars  and  artists  wandered  into  France  to  enjoy  the  pro- 
tection and  patronage  of  its  munificent  king.  Conspicuous 
among  these  and  one  of  the  first  was  the  Florentine  Luigi 
Alamanni,  author  of  a  didactic  poem  on  agriculture  patterned 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  247 

after  Virgil's  Georgics,  in  blank  verse.  The  sculptor  Cellini, 
the  painter  Bordone,  the  novelist  Bandello  followed  —  and  the 
last  was  gratified  by  the  gift  of  a  bishopric.  The  Jesuit 
reaction  was  the  finishing  blow  to  declining  humanism  in  Italy, 

—  and  perhaps  it  came  none  too  soon.     It  was  merited ;  for 
the  indecencies  of  Pietro  Aretino,  the  egotism,   extravagance 
and  license  of  Cellini,  were  indicative  of  the  degeneration  of 
genius  and  demanded  a  curb.     In  the  tales  of  Matteo  Bandello 

—  the    Boccaccio   of   this    later   Renascence  —  concupiscence 
moves    the    characters    about   like    pawns  on  a  chess  board. 
They  are  not  worthy  of  the  name  of  characters :  change  of  name 
and  incident  alone  give  variety  —  the  intrigue  is  ever  the  same. 

The  conversion  of  the  aged  Bembo  is  symbolical  of  the 
change  that  came  over  the  spirit  of  Italy:  he  was  made  a 
cardinal  in  1539  and  forthwith  forswore  the  cultivation  of  classic 
literature  as  profane. 

In  1542  Andrea  Palladio  began  his  careful  measurements 
of  old  Roman  buildings,  published  erelong  a  set  of  plans  and 
restored  elevations  and  elaborated  for  the  builders  of  the  reac- 
tion a  congenial  architectural  style,  ornate,  mechanical,  new 
Roman :  of  round  arches,  round  or  gabled  window-heads, 
superimposed  tiers  of  pilasters  of  different  orders,  and  balus- 
traded  eaves. 

During  those  years  Giorgio  Vasari,  Angelo's  pupil,  occupied 
himself  in  collecting,  before  it  was  too  late,  information  con- 
cerning the  artists  of  past  time  which  he  digested  in  his 
incomparable  "  Lives."  It  was  a  last  effort  of  the  mediaeval 
memory,  summing  up  the  results  of  a  long  day  of  creative 
activity. 

We  remark  finally  a  glowing  Italian  version  by  Bernardo 
Tasso  of  a  romance  long  popular  in  the  Spanish  peninsula  — 
the  Amadis  of  Gaul. 

In  the  realm  of  natural  science  the  overthrow  of  outworn 
authority  went  on  —  for  of  investigations  in  the  sphere  of 


248  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

matter  the  powers  that  be  are  rarely  apprehensive.  Under  and 
through  the  alchemy  of  the  Middle  Ages  modern  chemistry  was 
working  and  protruding  like  the  thumb  of  Ptah  through  his 
swathing-bands.  In  1541  the  troubled  career  of  Paracelsus 
closed  at  Salzburg.  He  first  made  science  stammer  in  the 
German  tongue  and  though  beset  by  teeming,  mystical  fan- 
cies struck  into  original  and  practicable  paths  of  research. 
In  token  of  his  breach  with  past  authority  he  gave  the  works 
of  Galen  to  the  flames. 

The  supremacy  of  the  great  Roman  anatomist  was  more 
cautiously  and  surely  undermined  by  the  Fleming,  Vesalius, 
whose  discoveries  also  superseded  Mondini's;  he  was  the 
father  of  modern  anatomy. 

Shortly  before  his  death  in  1543  Nicholas  Copernicus  pub- 
lished his  "  Revolutions  of  the  Heavenly  Bodies,"  relegating 
the  Ptolemaic  system  to  the  past ;  but  strange  to  say  that 
momentous  work  that  wrought  a  revolution  in  astronomy  only 
to  be  compared  with  Luther's  in  religion  or  with  the  discov- 
eries of  Columbus  and  da  Gama  remained  without  effect  until 
the  ensuing  century. 

The  same  year  the  first  great  botanic  garden  was  laid  out  at 
Padua.  And  through  the  decade  the  young  Swiss  naturalist, 
Conrad  Gesner,  was  travelling  far  and  wide,  studying  plants, 
which  he  aimed  to  classify  according  to  a  natural  system, 
gathering  materials  for  his  epoch-making  work  on  animals. 

The  reactionary  spirit  of  the  decade  was  not  without  its 
influence  on  the  temper  of  Luther ;  as  he  aged  he  grew  harder, 
his  opinions  crystallized,  he  waxed  ever  more  bitter  against 
the  Calvinists,  more  intolerant  of  all  variations  from  his 
standard.  Sebastian  Franck's  protest  was  especially  irritating 
to  him.  Franck  was  a  theologian  of  mystical  tendency  who 
made  appeal  from  Luther's  growing  dogmatism  to  a  higher 
spiritual  court  —  that  of  conscience  and  inward  conviction  of 
religious  truth.  He  was  the  spokesman  of  much  secret  dis- 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  249 

content  among  Germans  with  some  of  the  results  and  princi- 
ples of  the  Lutheran  reformation. 

The  sympathetic  attitude  of  Diirer  and  Cranach,  however, 
reminds  us  that  Luther  never  made  the  breach  with  art  that 
Zwingli  and  Calvin  made.  Indeed,  he  composed  a  series  of 
forcible  sermons  against  iconoclasts  that  are  beside  good 
specimens  of  his  German  style.  He  had  the  wisdom  to  set  his 
hymns  to  popular  melodies  and  thus  they  enjoyed  immense 
vogue.  Popular  literature  too  was  ever  his  ally  ;  Hans  Sachs, 
the  rhyming  shoemaker  of  Nuremberg,  in  countless  songs  and 
homely  satires  and  narratives  helped  to  advance  his  cause. 

In  England  the  late  spring-tide  of  reform  began  to  ebb. 
Henry  felt  that  the  religious  and  intellectual  movement  had 
gone  far  enough  and  needed  a  check — which  he  proceeded  to 
apply  through  the  notorious  Six  Articles  that  he  caused  his 
parliament  to  pass  in  the  year  1539.  Though  it  be  hard  to 
recollect  these  in  detail  it  is  easy  to  remember  that  their  pivot 
was  the  mass.  The  first  declared  that  the  doctrine  of  tran- 
substantiation  was  that  of  the  church  of  England ;  this  was 
followed  by  assertions  of  the  sufficiency  of  communion  in  one 
kind  and  the  efficacy  of  private  masses ;  confession  to  a  priest 
was  declared  to  be  a  pre-requisite  to  communion;  and  in 
remaining  articles  the  condition  of  celebrants  was  touched  on : 
sacerdotal  celibacy  was  enforced  and  the  binding  nature  of  the 
second  monastic  vow  was  set  forth.  This  last  was  a  pecu- 
liarly arbitrary  provision ;  it  was  levelled  at  the  hosts  of  monks 
that  wandered  up  and  down  the  land,  many  of  whom  after 
their  ruthless  ejection  from  their  old  homes  were  seeking  to 
make  new  ones  by  entering  the  marriage  relation  ;  by  this 
article  they  were  forbidden  to  become  thus  merged  in  general 
society. 

For  an  attempt  he  made  to  attach  the  king  to  the  protestant 
interest  in  Germany  Thomas  Cromwell  paid  the  forfeit  with 
his  head.  After  the  death  of  Jane  Seymour,  his  third  queen 


250  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

—  doubly  endeared  to  him  as  the  mother  of  his  son  Edward  — 
his  minister  pressed  upon  Henry  an  alliance  with  the  princess 
Anne  of  Cleves.      A  portrait   of  her   taken  by   Holbein  —  to 
whom  we  are  indebted  for  likenesses  of  many  distinguished 
personages  of  the  reign  —  so  attracted  the  king  that  the  match 
was  arranged  —  but  when  Anne  appeared  his  disappointment 
was  grievous  :  the  cunning  painter  had  flattered  her,  and  she 
could  speak  nothing  but  German,  of  which  he   understood  not 
a   word.      He   offered   therefore    to   become    her  affectionate 
brother ;  she  was  to  receive  a  pension  and  take  precedence 
next  after  his  queen  and  daughter.     Anne  was  complaisant, 
agreed  to  a  divorce  and  assumed  her  singular  position  at  the 
English  court.     But  Cromwell  went  to  the  block  on  a  charge  of 
heresy,  —  and  the  very  day  of  his  execution  the  king  wedded  a 
second  Catherine,  of  the  great  Catholic  house  of  Howard. 

The  familiar  political  combinations  of  the  past  now  repeated 
themselves  as  by  an  inner  necessity  ;  Henry  became  estranged 
from  his  late  ally  of  France,  drew  toward  his  imperial  friend  of 
former  times  and  the  partition  agreement  of  twenty  years 
before  was  reverted  to.  Francis  thereupon  renewed  his  alli- 
ance with  Suleiman  II  —  and  we  behold  again  the  familiar 
groups,  the  king  of  France,  German  Protestants,  and  Turks 
against  emperor  and  king  of  England  —  who  has  now  also  per- 
force a  war  with  Scotland  on  his  hands.  From  1543  to  1545 
the  European  war  dragged  on ;  it  was  not  pressed  with 
energy  by  either  party ;  Europe  was  exhausted  by  the  tremen- 
dous conflicts  of  the  past  half-century;  and  more  than  all 
Francis  himself  desired  reconciliation  with  the  church  and  the 
emperor,  —  he  too  would  become  a  prominent  representative 
of  the  reaction.  The  three  great  sovereigns  now  grown  old 
were  ready  and  willing  to  sustain  as  best  they  could  authority 
and  the  old  order,  — so  in  1545  peace  was  made  between  them, 

—  a  peace  that  Francis  made  haste  to  solemnize  by  a  ferocious 
massacre  of  the   Vaudois  —  the   Protestants   of  the   south    of 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  251 

France.  Henry  wielded  over  England  his  "whip  with  six 
strings,"  sending  Protestants  to  the  stake  for  infringing  his 
articles  while  Catholics  went  to  the  block  for  denying  his  eccle- 
siastical jurisdiction  ;  the  land  was  overawed  by  his  capricious, 
inscrutable  policy;  his  closing  years  were  a  true  reign  of 
terror.  His  minister  now  was  Stephen  Gardiner,  bishop  of 
Winchester  —  a  rigid  sacramentarian,  who  made  desperate 
efforts  to  bring  Cranmer  into  discredit,  instigating  against  him 
charges  of  heresy.  Hugh  Latimer,  who  had  resigned  his 
bishopric  of  Worcester  upon  the  passage  of  the  Six  Articles, 
was  sent  to  the  tower.  Yet  ever  and  anon  the  reformers 
were  heartened  by  some  act  like  that  which  directed  that 
copies  of  the  Bible  in  English  (Tyndale's  version  as  revised 
by  Coverdale  and  others)  should  be  exhibited  in  parish 
churches,  or  that  which  provided  for  the  publication  of  part 
of  the  service  in  the  mother  tongue.  Henry's  marriage  to 
his  last  queen,  Catherine  Parr,  was  regarded  as  auspicious  to 
their  cause  toward  which  she  was  well  inclined,  — but  in  con- 
versations with  the  king  on  doctrinal  subjects  she  gave  too  free 
expression  to  her  views,  was  for  an  instant  in  grave  peril  and 
only  extricated  herself  by  a  prudent  submission. 

Among  the  victims  offered  up  to  the  dogma  of  transub- 
stantiation  none  engaged  deeper  sympathy  than  the  gentle, 
devoted  and  long-suffering  Anne  Askew,  who  was  burnt  at 
Smithfield  in  1546.  The  height  of  the  reaction  headed  in 
Scotland  by  the  evil  Cardinal  Beaton  was  marked  that  year 
by  the  burning  of  George  Wishart,  a  distinguished  evangelical 
preacher. 

The  domestic  condition  of  England  continued  unprosperous. 
The  king's  necessities  led  him  to  commit  one  of  the  gravest 
injuries  a  government  can  inflict  on  its  people  ;  he  debased 
the  coinage,  —  and  workers  found  their  wages  shrivel  in  their 
hands  they  understood  not  why.  The  discontent  and  suffering 
were  grievous.  In  consequence  partly  of  the  industrial  depres- 


252  OUTLINE   OF   THE  PHILOSOPHY 

sion,  partly  of  the  suppression  of  the  monasteries  where  relief 
has  been  dispensed  of  old,  vagabondage  and  pauperism 
attained  dimensions  so  alarming  that  the  rudiment  of  a  poor- 
law  had  to  be  devised  :  "sturdy  vagabonds  "  —voluntary  pau- 
pers—  were  to  be  repressed  and  the  deserving  poor  to  be 
relieved  from  funds  dispensed  by  episcopal  almoners.  The 
defect  of  the  measure  was  that  public  charity  alone  was  relied 
on  to  supply  the  funds  which  were  hence  uncertain  and  in  bad 
times  quite  inadequate. 

The  literature  of  the  end  of  the  reign  was  scant  and  scarce 
worth  mentioning  ;  indeed,  none  could  flourish  in  that  atmos- 
phere of  fear  and  suspicion  ;  in  his  determination  to  suppress 
all  opposition  to  his  arbitrary  will  Henry  would  seem  to  have 
been  animated  by  a  desire  to  annihilate  literature.  One  by  one 
its  foremost  representatives  were  killed  off.  Tyndale  and  More 
had  been  extinguished ;  upon  the  fall  of  Cromwell  Wyatt  was 
committed  to  the  Tower,  and  having  been  commanded  to  join 
the  king  at  Falmouth  died  on  the  journey  of  a  fever  contracted 
in  his  anxious  haste ;  and  a  crowning  injustice  was  the  execu- 
tion of  Surrey  because  there  coursed  in  his  veins  a  strain  of 
royal  blood. 

The  king  even  brought  legislation  to  bear  upon  literature  and 
the  drama,  his  object  being  the  suppression  of  all  publications 
in  English  upon  the  subject  of  religion.  By  an  act  of  the  year 
1542  he  put  a  stop  to  the  performance  of  the  old  mysteries  and 
forbade  all  religious  plays,  ballads  and  songs  (of  which  many 
satirical  specimens  were  current)  as  "  noisome  to  the  peace  of 
the  church." 

Before  his  decease  in  1546  Sir  Thomas  Elyot  had  the  satis- 
faction of  seeing  his  hints  on  archery  expanded  into  an  elaborate 
treatise,  the  "  Toxophilus  "  or  "  School  of  Shooting,"  by  his 
young  friend  Roger  Ascham.  It  is  in  the  form  of  a  dialogue. 
Archery  is  pronounced  a  most  honest  pastime,  indulged  in  by 
the  ancients,  wholesome  for  princes  and  students  ;  cards  are 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  253 

condemned  as  devoid  of  exercise  and  honesty ;  and  music  of 
the  new  school  "  so  nicely  fingered,  so  sweetly  tuned  "  is  dis- 
countenanced as  too  nearly  resembling  the  Lydian  mode  : 
beside,  Galen  has  said  that  "  much  music  marreth  men's  man- 
ners." An  exception  is  made  as  to  old-fashioned  plain-song 
which  is  declining  and  should  be  encouraged.  Here  accord- 
ingly we  have  a  quaint  musical  corollary  to  the  doctrinal 
reaction ! 

By  that  time  John  Leland,  who  held  the  unique  office  of 
king's  antiquary,  had  finished  his  great  tour  over  England  in 
the  course  of  which  he  visited  every  city,  manor-house,  castle 
and  monastery  in  the  kingdom  —  if  we  may  believe  his  declara- 
tion, —  and  saved  as  many  manuscripts  as  he  could  from  the 
wreck,  distressing  to  his  honest  soul,  of  the  monastic  libraries. 
That  archaeological  survey  at  the  moment  when  the  Middle 
Ages  were  expiring  was  like  memory,  recapitulating  at  eventide 
the  toils  and  triumphs  of  the  day.  It  testified  to  the  rise  of 
national  sentiment  and  an  historic  sense,  —  uncritical  though 
it  might  be :  in  Leland  the  Arthurian  legends  found  a  last 
defender  :  he  published  a  Latin  assertion  of  their  genuineness. 

Now  it  was  that  written  sermons  began  to  supersede  the  old 
fashion  of  free  and  familiar  delivery.  Precision  of  statement 
and  literary  finish  might  thus  be  attained  —  but  it  was  at  the 
expense  of  the  energy,  picturesqueness  and  directness  of  appeal 
of  the  extemporaneous  style. 

Luther  died  in  1546,  none  too  soon  for  him  —  he  just  escaped 
witnessing  a  seeming  obliteration  of  German  Protestantism. 
The  year  1547  was  the  low- water  mark  of  the  reaction;  the 
protestant  leaders  were  divided  among  themselves  and  para- 
lyzed by  doubt  and  treachery ;  their  wholly  inadequate  force 
melted  away  before  the  emperor  at  Miihlberg  and  Germany 
was  at  his  feet.  But  the  same  year  Henry  and  Francis  passed 
away  leaving  the  stage  clear  for  new  characters  —  Cardinal 
Beaton  had  paid  for  his  tyranny  with  his  life,  —  and  western 


254  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

Europe  breathed  more  freely.  Slowly  the  tide  began  to  turn 
and  a  fifth  chapter  in  Reformation  history  opened  —  a  fresh 
and  even  more  vigorous  forward  movement  than  the  last.  In 
the  course  of  a  few  years  Charles  lost  the  magnificent  position 
he  had  gained  by  his  victory  at  Miihlberg ;  the  new  king  of 
France  allied  himself  with  the  protestant  princes  to  undo  its 
results  and  received  from  them  a  bit  of  territory  on  the  bank 
of  the  Rhine  with  the  title  "  Protector  of  the  Liberties  of  Ger- 
many"; in  1552  the  Turks  took  Temesvar ;  and  the  emperor 
was  constrained  to  conclude  with  the  Protestants  what  was  to 
him  the  humiliating  truce  of  Passau,  granting  them  freedom  of 
worship  according  to  the  terms  of  that  early  decree  of  Speyer. 
In  1555  this  was  made  the  basis  of  the  general  and  lasting 
religious  pacification  of  Augsburg ;  the  labor  of  his  life  seemed 
thrown  away  and  the  unhappy  old  emperor,  bitterly  repenting 
that  he  had  let  Luther  escape  him,  conscious  that  his  whole  long 
career  was  a  failure,  abdicated  and  went  into  a  monastery 
where  he  soon  after  died. 

Henry's  attempt  to  graft  a  reformed,  national  polity  upon  the 
old  system  of  faith  and  worship  had  proved  impracticable  and 
in  his  son's  reign  the  latter  went  by  the  board.  The  boy-king 
Edward  was  a  zealous  little  Protestant  ;  his  maternal  uncle  and 
guardian,  the  duke  of  Somerset,  was  hand  and  glove  with  the 
reforming  party  ;  Cranmer's  star  was  in  the  ascendant,  Latimer 
was  released  from  the  Tower  where  he  had  spent  the  years  of 
reaction,  and  radical  changes  in  the  mode  of  worship  were  con- 
summated ;  in  fact  the  existing  ecclesiastical  system  of  England 
was  then  fully  inaugurated.  The  Six  Articles  were  rescinded  ; 
with  the  doctrine  of  the  corporal  presence  of  Christ  in  the 
eucharist  private  masses  ceased,  both  elements  were  adminis- 
tered to  the  laity,  and  the  clergy  were  allowed  to  wed.  The 
liturgy  was  done  into  English;  in  the  year  1548  the  Book  of 
Common  Prayer  appeared  —  the  famous  "  First  Book  of  King 
Edward  VI."  These  sweeping  changes  seemed  revolutionary 


OF  ENGLISH  LITER  A  TURE.  255 

to  Bishop  Gardiner  and  his  compeer  Bonner  of  London ;  they 
remonstrated,  were  cast  into  prison  and  shortly  deprived  of 
their  sees.  Ridley  was  appointed  in  Bonner's  room  and 
Hooper  to  be  bishop  of  Gloucester :  his  scruples  about  wearing 
the  episcopal  vestments,  which  he  called  idolatrous  and  impious, 
delayed  the  latter's  installation.  In  Hooper  the  lineaments  of 
the  Puritan  can  be  plainly  discerned.  To  minds  of  his  stamp 
it  seemed  that  the  church  was  not  yet  reduced  to  the  just 
evangelical  model ;  the  agitation  went  on ;  after  the  crushing 
defeat  of  Miihlberg  several  eminent  continental  reformers  took 
refuge  in  England  and  pointed  out  defects  in  the  prayer-book 
which  permitted  quite  too  many  of  the  old  ceremonies  for 
their  taste.  More  statues  and  pictures  were  removed  from  the 
churches ;  the  ancient  stone  altars  gave  place  to  communion 
tables  and  candles  were  no  longer  seen;  in  the  year  1552  the 
Second  Book  of  Edward  VI  registered  the  further  rise  of  the 
tide.  Objectionable  practices  allowed  by  the  former  book  were 
dropped ;  the  sentences  used  when  administering  the  elements 
were  altered  to  accord  with  the  merely  commemorative  view ; 
and  worship  became  in  outward  form  and  in  inward  spirit 
evangelical. 

It  is  interesting  to  observe  how  Wyclif's  fame  after  its  long 
eclipse  came  out  now  in  full  lustre:  indeed,  through  the  vary- 
ing phases  of  doctrine  that  we  have  been  studying,  what  men 
thought  of  him  was  a  ready  gauge  of  their  position.  Cranmer 
took  issue  with  Gardiner  about  him :  "  John  Wyclif  was  a 
singular  instrument  of  God  in  his  time  to  set  forth  the  truth 
of  Christ's  Gospel,  but  Antichrist  that  sitteth  in  God's  temple 
boasting  himself  as  God  hath  by  God's  sufferance  prevailed 
against  many  holy  men  and  sucked  the  blood  of  martyrs  these 
late  years."  The  passage  occurs  in  the  archbishop's  "Answer 
to  a  Crafty  and  Sophistical  Cavillation "  of  his  old  enemy 
"against  the  true  and  godly  doctrine"  of  the  sacrament. 
The  treatise  is  not  agreeable  either  in  temper  or  style  —  it 


256  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

could  scarcely  be  expected  to  be,  —  but  it  defines  clearly  its 
author's  position.  He  believed  that  "the  very  body  of  the 
tree  or  rather  the  root  of  the  weeds  —  beads,  pardons,  pil- 
grimages, indulgences,  service  in  Latin  etc.  —  is  the  popish 
doctrine  of  transubstantiation."  He  appealed  to  Christ's  in- 
stitution :  none  of  his  apostles  were  so  "  fond  "  as  not  to  know 
that  the  bread  was  not  his  body  nor  the  wine  his  blood.  Our 
opponents  "  teach  that  Christ  is  in  the  bread  and  wine.  But 
we  say  according  to  the  truth  that  he  is  in  them  that  worthily 
eat  and  drink  the  bread  and  wine.  My  meaning  is  that  the 
force,  the  grace,  the  virtue  and  benefit  of  Christ's  body  that  was 
crucified  for  us  and  of  his  blood  that  was  shed  for  us  be  really 
and  effectually  present  with  all  them  that  duly  receive  the  sac- 
raments—  but  all  this  I  understand  of  his  spiritual  presence. 
.  .  .  Nor  no  more  truly  is  he  corporally  or  really  present  in  the 
due  ministration  of  the  Lord's  Supper  than  he  is  in  the  due 
ministration  of  baptism."  Bread,  wine  and  water  are  signs 
and  tokens,  not  to  be  worshipped ;  yet  Christ  is  in  them  as  he 
is  in  his  Word  "  when  he  worketh  mightily  by  the  same  in  the 
hearts  of  the  hearers";  he  is  not  present  in  the  voice  of  the 
speaker  but  uses  it  as  he  does  his  sacraments. 

The  noblest  figure  in  the  English  reformation  was  without 
question  that  of  Bishop  Latimer,  —  a  brave  man,  earnest,  large- 
hearted,  buoyant  of  spirit  —  of  all  the  reformers  of  the  island- 
kingdom  he  most  resembled  Luther.  In  his  youth  as  he 
himself  testified  he  was  as  "  obstinate  a  papist  as  any  in  the 
kingdom,  —  zealous  without  knowledge  "  like  Saul  the  perse- 
cutor; when  he  was  converted  he  became  a  sturdy  pillar  of 
evangelic  faith.  He  was  much  the  most  popfilar  preacher  of 
the  day  and  he  magnified  his  office.  His  famous  "  Sermon  on 
the  Plough,"  conceived  in  the  quaint,  allegorical  style  that  the 
people  loved,  enforced  the  duty  of  preaching.  It  was  delivered 
at  St.  Paul's  in  the  winter  of  1549.  Taking  a  passage  out  of 
St.  Luke's  gospel  as  his  starting-point,  — "  the  Seed  is  the 


of  ENGLISH  LITERATURE,  257 

Word  of  God"— -he  proceeded  to  draw  a  parallel  between 
the  ploughman  and  a  preacher.  Erelong  he  rose  into  a  pro- 
phetic strain,  denouncing  the  pride  and  wickedness  of  London, 
calling  upon  its  people  to  repent,  —  "but  London  cannot  abide 
to  be  rebuked,  such  is  the  nature  of  man ;  they  will  not  amend 
their  faults  and  they  will  not  be  ill  spoken  of."  Nevertheless 
he  hesitated  not  fearlessly  to  expose  its  sins  and  to  score  those 
"unpreaching  prelates"  whom  he  held  to  be  largely  responsible 
for  the  wide-spread  ignorance  and  wrong-doing.  We  can  divine 
the  hush  that  fell  upon  the  great  congregation  as  the  orator 
engaged  closer  attention  by  the  sudden  question,  "Who  is  the 
most  diligent  bishop  and  prelate  in  all  England  that  passeth 
all  the  rest  in  doing  his  office  ?  I  can  tell  for  I  know  him 
well.  But  now  I  think  I  see  you  listening  and  harkening  that  I 
should  name  him.  Will  ye  know  who  it  is  ?  I  will  tell  you  ; 
it  is  the  Devil.  He  is  the  most  diligent  preacher  of  all  other, 
he  is  never  out  of  his  diocese,  ye  shall  never  find  him  unoccu- 
pied, he  keepeth  residence  at  all  times,  he  is  ever  at  his 
plough." 

The  ensuing  Lent,  Latimer  delivered  a  series  of  six  sermons 
before  the  boy  king  and  on  one  occasion  in  the  following  year 
preached  to  him  both  in  the  morning  and  afternoon  of  the  same 
day.  Still  in  prophetic  vein  he  chose  as  his  subject  avarice 
and  lust  and  their  connection,  which  he  illustrated  by  the 
adulteries  that  follow  marriages  for  money.  He  returned  to 
his  charge  against  London  —  as  wicked  a  city  as  Nineveh, 
equally  in  need  of  repentance. 

An  example  of  his  homiletic  allegorizing  almost  as  good  as 
his  sermon  on  the  plough  was  that  "  on  the  Card,"  in  which  he 
drew  a  moral  from  the  popular  pastime :  in  the  game  of  life 
"  hearts  is  trumps,  as  I  said." 

"  If  thou  build  a  hundred  churches,  give  as  much  as  thou 
canst  make  to  the  gilding  of  saints  and  honoring  of  the  church 
and  offer  as  great  candles  as  oaks,  if  thou  leave  the  works  of 


258  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

mercy  and  the  commandments  undone  these  works  shall 
nothing  avail  thee,"-  — yet  of  themselves  they  are  good. 
Latimer  was  not  an  iconoclast. 

In  1549  appeared  a  metrical  version  of  parts  of  the  psalter 

—  the  work  of  Thomas  Sternhold,  who  died  that  year.     The 
collection  was  subsequently   enlarged   by  John  Hopkins  and 
enjoyed  for  generations  an  extraordinary  popularity. 

A  single  dramatic  effort  is  extant  of  the  reign  of  Edward  VI 

—  the  comedy  of  "Ralph  Roister  Doister  "  by  Nicholas  Udall, 
formerly  master  of  Eton  College.     Other  plays  that  he  com- 
posed have  been  lost.     Ralph  is  a  brainless,  rakish  fellow  of 
the  town  who  is  beguiled  by  a  cunning   parasite  called  Mery- 
greek  —  an   English   Lazarillo  —  and  is  helped  and  hindered 
by  him  in  a  vain  but  persistent  suit  he  pays  to  a  well-to-do 
widow.     The  rhyme,  metre  and  diction  of  the  play  are  those 
of  the  homely  popular  tales  of  former  times,  the  dialogue  is 
easy  and  familiar,   and  the  action  progresses   through  well- 
defined  acts  and  scenes. 

The  date  of  its  appearance  is  fixed  by  a  reference  made  to  it 
by  Thomas  Wilson,  the  rhetorician,  who  published  a  treatise  on 
rhetoric  and  logic  in  the  year  1553.  His  object  was  the  purifi- 
cation of  the  spoken  language  from  the  classic  and  foreign  terms 
with  which  scholars,  travellers  and  the  fashionable  delighted 
to  encrust  it.  There  is  much  sensible  advice  in  the  book : 
"  Never  affect  inkhorn  terms  or  be  over-fine.  Only  the  foolish 
fantastical  Latin  their  tongues;  journeyed  gentlemen,  for  show, 
talk  a  French  or  Italianate  English  and  the  fine  courtier  talks 
nothing  but  Chaucer."  Men  were  still  half-ashamed  of  their 
native  tongue  which  was  then  just  emerging  from  its  state  of 
immaturity ;  it  is  evident  that  it  was  undergoing  that  expansion 
of  vocabulary  that  was  to  make  it  the  great  medium  of  expres- 
sion for  the  coming  generation ;  but  many  in  their  half-culture, 
their  would-be  elegance,  were  making  mistakes  in  taste  and 
selection.  Against  such  Wilson's  was  a  manly  and  useful  protest. 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  259 

Sir  John  Cheke,  the  most  eminent  classical  scholar  in  the 
kingdom  and  Edward's  tutor  in  Greek,  who  had  in  the  last 
reign  had  a  sharp  controversy  with  bishop  Gardiner  as  to  the 
proper  pronunciation  of  that  language,  was  equally  jealous  of 
the  purity  of  his  native  speech  and  sought  to  expunge  from  its 
vocabulary  words  and  phrases  that  had  crept  into  it  from 
foreign  languages.  He  also  suggested  a  simplification  of  its 
spelling. 

We  note  elsewhere  interest  in  the  vernacular  ;  Sir  David 
Lindsay  penned  a  vigorous  defence  of  his  in  the  opening  of 
his  "  Dialogue  concerning  the  Monarchy,"  —  a  long  metrical 
account  of  ancient  empires  that  winds  up  with  an  attack  upon 
the  papal  monarchy  in  the  style  with  which  we  are  already 
familiar.  It  was  the  last  monument  of  the  old  northern  or 
mediaeval  Scottish  dialect,  the  literary  history  of  which  we 
have  traced  for  two  hundred  years ;  its  author  died  soon  after. 

A  highly  interesting  parallel  to  these  efforts  for  the  extended 
use,  enrichment  and  purification  of  the  vernacular  is  offered 
by  a  school  of  French  writers  that  rose  at  this  very  era.  Its 
programme  was  set  forth  in  an  enthusiastic  "  Defence  of  the 
French  language  "  published  in  the  year  1549,  — the  maiden 
essay  of  a  young  poet  named  Joachim  du  Bellay  whose  dawning 
talent  had  been  marked  by  king  Francis  and  the  queen  of 
Navarre.  After  the  fashion  of  the  Renascence  he  was  dubbed 
"  the  French  Ovid."  His  defence  of  his  mother  tongue  con- 
sisted in  a  word  in  the  proposition  that  it  was  quite  capable  of 
appropriating  spoil  from  Latin  and  Greek.  A  favorite  analogy 
was  the  practice  of  the  Latin  authors  who,  though  profoundly 
versed  in  Greek,  did  not  therefore  discard  their  own  language 
but  applied  their  scholarship  to  its  enrichment  and  regulation. 
For  the  attainment  of  these  ends  du  Bellay  and  his  followers 
accordingly  introduced  into  the  language  shoals  of  classic 
terms  and  to  give  it  exquisite  polish  cultivated  the  sonnet 
with  especial  zeal. 


260  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

After  the  appearance  of  his  treatise  which  was  the  literary 
sensation  of  the  hour,  du  Bellay  visited  Rome  where  he  spent 
some  years.  He  exemplified  his  theory  in  a  set  of  over  a  hun- 
dred sonnets  "To  Olive  "  and  returned  in  the  year  1552  with 
forty-five  more  on  "The  Ruins  of  Rome."  He  was  henceforth 
a  particular  star  at  the  court  of  Henry  II.  His  contem- 
porary, Pierre  Ronsard,  cooperated  powerfully  in  the  movement 
and  erelong  eclipsed  his  fame,  winning  from  the  admiring 
court  the  title  "Prince  of  Poets."  He  applied  himself  to 
composing  French  odes  in  imitation  of  Horace.  His  preceptor 
in  the  classics,  Jean  Dorat  —  "the  French  Pindar"  —was  the 
Nestor  of  the  movement,  which  progressed  in  spite  of  the 
ridicule  of  Rabelais — now  approaching  his  end. 

The  year  that  du  Bellay  returned  from  Rome  a  disciple  of 
his,  fitienne  Jodelle,  then  but  twenty  years  of  age,  made  him- 
self the  pioneer  of  an  important  form — classic  tragedy — by 
his  play  "  Cleopatra."  It  was  characterized  by  the  mingled 
weakness  and  extravagance,  the  frigid,  imitative  rendering  of 
heroic  passions  common  to  first  efforts  in  this  line,  —  but  it 
was  hailed  by  Ronsard  the  arbiter  as  equal  to  anything  of 
Sophocles  and  it  furnished  a  model  of  its  kind  for  coming 
centuries. 

The  four  poets  just  mentioned  made  up  with  some  lights  of 
less  magnitude  the  celebrated  group  of  the  Pleiade.  One  of 
the  latter,  Baif  by  name,  translated  two  of  Euripides'  tragedies 
and  became  an  exemplar  of  the  tendency  of  the  school  to 
degenerate  into  mere  academic  correctness. 

While  the  affairs  of  the  Protestants  were  prospering  in  Ger- 
many the  death  of  Edward  VI  in  the  summer  of  1553  opened 
the  way  for  a  third  Catholic  reaction,  the  most  vehement  of  all, 
proportioned  to  the  thoroughness  of  the  late  reform.  It  was 
the  sixth  and  last  chapter  in  the  long  contest  between  mediae- 
val and  modern  ideas.  The  princess  Mary  came  to  the  throne 
at  the  mature  age  of  thirty-six,  her  nature  embittered  by  many 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  261 

injuries  and  by  the  thought  of  the  ill-usage  endured  by  a  mother 
whom  she  deeply  loved  and  whose  memory  it  was  her  dearest 
consolation  to  defend.  She  inherited  her  father's  tenacity  of 
will  but  she  was  more  than  half  her  mother's  daughter ;  her 
affections  were  fixed  upon  her  mother's  land  of  Spain.  Hence 
from  the  first  her  whole  heart  was  engaged  in  the  project 
broached  by  the  emperor  of  a  marriage  with  his  son  Philip. 
Her  devotion  to  her  mother's  faith  was  absolute :  to  restore  it 
in  its  integrity  was  the  object  of  her  reign.  She  passed  over 
therefore  the  latter  part  of  her  father's  reign,  aiming  not  only 
to  maintain  as  he  had  done  Catholic  doctrine  but  also  to  restore 
the  ancient  form  of  church  government,  and  took  as  her  ideal 
the  system  of  his  earlier  years,  of  her  mother's  time. 

Gardiner's  star  was  now  in  the  ascendant;  he  was  restored 
to  his  see  and  was  appointed  chancellor.  Hooper  and  Cover- 
dale  were  incarcerated  in  the  Fleet,  Ridley  and  Latimer  in  the 
Tower  where  they  were  soon  followed  by  Cranmer;  other 
prominent  reformers  fled  to  the  continent.  Bonner  was  rein- 
stated in  his  bishopric  of  London  and  straightway  the  old 
crucifixes  reappeared  in  the  churches  of  his  diocese  and  the 
texts  with  which  the  reformers  had  decorated  their  walls  were 
blotted  out. 

Proceedings  were  hastened  to  reconcile  England  with  the 
see  of  Rome.  The  queen's  obsequious  parliament  declared 
that  the  marriage  of  Henry  and  Catherine  had  been  valid  and 
reversed  Cranmer's  sentence  of  divorce  ;  every  act  of  the  late 
reign  touching  religion  was  revoked ;  and  Mary's  kinsman, 
Cardinal  Pole,  came  sailing  up  the  Thames  in  his  barge  to 
receive  as  papal  legate  the  submission  of  the  kingdom  through 
its  representatives.  Parliament  bent  the  knee,  was  absolved 
by  him  from  the  sins  of  heresy  and  schism,  and  renewed  the 
act  for  burning  heretics. 

The  sacrament  became  afresh  the  subject  of  impassioned 
controversy ;  the  advocates  of  tran substantiation,  flushed  with 


262  OUTLINE    OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

triumph,  balked  not  at  its  ultimate  absurdity,  asserting  that  at 
the  Last  Supper  Jesus  ate  his  own  body.  The  celibacy  of  the 
clergy  was  enforced,  married  ministrants  were  ejected  from 
their  livings.  The  queen's  forwardness  was  yet  too  slow  for 
the  ungrateful  pope  :  he  demanded  restitution  of  all  the  old 
church  lands  ;  but  here  Mary's  hands  were  tied.  Of  her  own 
means  however  she  managed  to  found  anew  a  few  abbeys. 

There  is  something  pathetic  in  this  half  heart-sick  attempt  to 
stay  a  vanishing  ideal. 

That  the  mediaeval  revival  might  be  whole  and  entire  the 
old-time  culture  was  brought  into  fashion  again  ;  the  literature, 
amusements  and  popular  customs  of  past  centuries  were 
revived  by  authority.  The  mystery-plays  lately  forbidden  were 
sanctioned  once  more,  the  May-games  and  dances  ;  again  on 
the  Feast  of  Fools  boys  played  the  bishop  or  abbot  and 
mimicked  the  solemn  ceremonies  of  the  church.  By  such 
strange  pastimes  an  outlet  had  been  provided  for  the  latent 
skepticism  of  the  mediaeval  populace  —  lest  its  mocking  mood 
should  flash  into  something  more  serious. 

In  1554  a  fine  edition  of  Gower's  "  Confessio  Amantis"  was 
gotten  out,  in  1555  a  like  one  of  Lydgate's  Troy-book;  and  the 
same  year  (a  symbolic  act)  Chaucer's  bones  were  reinterred  in 
a  Gothic  tomb,  —  the  first  of  poets  in  the  since  famous  corner 
of  England's  historic  abbey.  That  year  too  the  legend  of  the 
Sangreal  appeared  in  a  Spanish  dress  —  a  romantic  emblem  of 
the  alliance  subsisting  between  the  two  countries. 

In  1557  a  certain  Richard  Tottell  got  out  a  collection  of 
poems  by  various  hands — Surrey's  and  Wyatt's  among  the 
number  —  from  which  we  single  out  two  for  particular  mention 
because  they  were  written  in  blank  verse.  Their  subjects  were 
the  deaths  of  Cicero  and  Zoroas  (an  Egyptian  astrologer  of 
Alexander's  day),  —  their  author  was  one  Nicholas  Grimald 
(of  Italian  descent,  as  his  name  implies).  These  new  speci- 
mens of  English  blank  verse  are  marked  by  more  variable 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  263 

caesura  than  Surrey's  and  are  altogether  more  flexible  than 
his  ;  run-on  lines  are  frequent  and  light  endings  even  appear. 
In  the  last  reign  Grimald  had  been  Bishop  Ridley's  chaplain 
but  under  Mary  he  made  little  difficulty  about  conforming  to 
the  reestablished  mode  of  worship. 

The  jocund  John  Heywood  was  among  the  contributors  to 
Tottell's  "  Miscellany."  He  had  suffered  some  shrewd  turns 
in  the  late  inconstant  times ;  toward  the  end  of  Henry's  reign 
he  had  been  taxed  with  treasonable  views  touching  the  king's 
ecclesiastical  supremacy  and  had  made  unconditional  surren- 
der ;  under  Edward  it  is  said,  perhaps  jocosely,  that  his  droll 
wit  alone  saved  him  from  hanging.  The  accession  of  his 
former  patroness  was  hailed  by  him  with  joy ;  it  promised  a 
safe  covert  from  such  reverses  for  his  sentiments  accorded 
entirely  with  hers ;  the  years  of  her  reign  were  fulfilled  of 
halcyon  days  for  him.  He  greeted  her  upon  her  coronation 
with  a  congratulatory  address  in  Latin,  and  celebrated  her 
union  with  Philip  in  a  song.  His  humor  was  grateful  to  her 
and  often  lightened  her  melancholy  moods.  In  1556  he  pro- 
duced a  lengthy  allegorical  poem  in  his  quaint  vein,  "The 
Spider  and  the  Fly,"-  — the  Protestants  being  figured  by  the 
ruthless  spiders,  the  Catholics  by  the  innocent  flies:  the  heroine 
of  this  epic  fable  was  of  course  the  queen,  who  appeared  in  the 
character  of  a  house-maid,  wielding  the  broom  of  her  temporal 
power  at  the  bidding  of  her  Lord  and  sovereign  Lady,  the 
church. 

The  laureateship  of  the  reign  was  about  evenly  divided  be- 
tween Heywood  and  William  Forrest  —  the  queen's  chaplain. 
In  Edward's  time  he  had  been  forced  to  conform  sorely  against 
his  will  to  the  reformed  worship.  He  addressed  to  the  young 
king  a  long  didactic  effort  bearing  the  sounding  alliterative 
title  "A  Pleasant  Poesy  of  Princely  Practice  "  in  which  he 
enlarged  upon  the  unhappy  condition  of  the  laboring  poor 
and  the  duty  of  a  prince  in  such  an  exigency.  Only  a  few 


264  OUTLINE   OF   THE   PHILOSOPHY 

months  before  Mary's  death  he  finished  and  presented  to  her 
in  manuscript  his  metrical  vindication  of  her  mother's  memory, 
containing  his  interpretation  of  recent  history.  Catherine  of 
Aragon  in  the  character  of  the  Second  Griselda  gave  title  to 
the  work,  which  was  couched  in  the  Chaucerian  stanza.  Ere 
the  exemplary  queen  was  deposed  the  land  flourished  in  plenty, 
God's  service  was  maintained  and  the  rich  helped  the  poor  — 
Griselda  in  special  was  kind  to  them.  She  attended  matins  at 
Greenwich  priory  and  had  an  image  of  Christ's  passion  made 
—  "not  of  idolatrous  intent  as  certain  miserable  men  hold." 
The  rhymer  is  severe  on  Wolsey,  who  was  no  friend  to  Griselda; 
"yet  he  had  an  edifying  end — God  shield  his  soul  from  the 
infernal  flame  ! "  With  the  divorce  began  the  affliction  of  both 
church  and  realm ;  schisms,  sects  and  heresies  of  Satan's  own 
raising  entered  in ;  the  king  — "  expressed  by  the  name  of 
Walter  —  was  led  somewhat  by  light  persons  ";  bad  counsellors 
and  agents  took  the  place  of  good,  self-will  was  the  chief  ruler, 
truth  was  set  aside,  the  saints  were  slandered,  the  blessed  Virgin 
Mary  was  no  better  esteemed  than  any  other  woman  and  any 
dunghill  was  as  good  as  the  sanctuary : 

"  These  mischiefs  with  hundredfold  moe  began 
At  the  incoming  of  this  new  Queen  Anne." 

Now  the  realm  rapidly  decayed,  the  poor  suffered  penury, 
rents  were  raised  and  there  was  dearth ;  fasting  was  made  a 
jest,  down  went  crosses,  churches  and  monasteries.  But  Gri- 
selda's  life  was  a  pattern  of  piety  and  she  made  a  good  end, 
receiving  extreme  unction.  "  Now  she  prays  for  us  —  though 
wretched  men  seduced  by  Satan  say  that  saints'  prayers  profit 
nothing  :  through  hers  I  firmly  believe  we  have  been  called 
back  of  late  from  the  damnable  race  we  were  running." 

The  leading  representative  of  the  new  learning  fell  a  sacrifice 
to  the  violent  ecclesiastical  rebound.  Men  of  the  old  school 
were  thoroughly  convinced  that  Greek  letters  had  been  largely 
responsible  for  the  late  religious  upheaval:  and  in  Sir  John 


OF  ENGLISH  LITERATURE.  265 

Cheke  a  conspicuous  victim  was  found.  His  heart  was  wholly 
in  the  cause  of  the  reform ;  but  now  in  age  and  weakness,  in 
prison,  trembling  at  the  threat  of  torture,  he  sent  in  his  recan- 
tation and  was  released  —  only  to  die  of  shame  and  distress  of 
spirit  for  his  betrayal  of  the  truth. 

The  queen's  Spanish  match  was  generally  unpopular  and 
was  made  the  pretext  for  a  rising  which  was  speedily  put  down 
but  which  involved  the  execution  of  the  sweet  and  hapless  Lady 
Jane  Grey,  a  gentle  representative  of  the  new  learning  and  the 
reformed  faith.  The  princess  Elizabeth  even  was  in  danger : 
she  was  suspected  of  complicity  in  the  insurrection  and  was 
lodged  for  a  time  in  the  Tower. 

The  inmost  nature  of  the  desperate  doctrinal  reaction,  the 
madness  of  a  failing  cause,  had  to  be  revealed,  the  connection 
of  papal  supremacy,  the  mass  and  persecution  to  be  plainly 
exhibited.  Squibs  and  satires  upon  the  mass  were  many  and 
were  a  vexation  of  spirit  to  Mary  and  her  counsellors  as  similar 
ones  had  been  to  her  father  in  his  age.  Under  the  lately  re- 
vived statute  for  the  punishment  of  heretics  the  burning  of 
protestant  martyrs  began.  The  design  was  by  a  few  single 
examples  to  intimidate  the  whole  body.  So  early  in  1555 
Hooper  was  burnt  at  Gloucester  and  Bishop  Farrar  of  St. 
David's  at  Carmarthen ;  in  the  autumn  Ridley  and  Latimer 
were  sacrificed  at  Oxford,  the  latter  crying  out  as  the  fagots 
were  heaped  around  them,  "  Be  of  good  cheer,  Master  Ridley, 
and  play  the  man,  for  we  shall  this  day  light  such  a  candle  in 
England  as  I  trust  shall  never  be  put  out."  Gardiner  died  a 
few  weeks  after  in  remorse  of  soul  and  dismay  at  the  magnitude 
of  the  odious  task  to  which  he  was  committed :  the  number  of 
victims  greatly  surpassed  his  expectations.  The  following 
spring  Archbishop  Cranmer  also  perished  in  the  flames  at  Ox- 
ford. He  had  shown  little  of  the  spirit  of  the  hero,  but  his 
case  was  pitiable  in  the  extreme  and  excited  general  com- 
miseration. Cardinal  Pole  was  now  invested  with  the  primacy. 


266  OUTLINE   OF  PHILOSOPHY. 

In  the  course  of  this  oppressive  reign  about  three  hundred 
persons  suffered  an  excruciating  death.  Kent  —  the  scene  of 
the  late  insurrection  —  the  city  of  London  and  the  eastern 
midland  furnished  most  of  the  victims.  In  its  frenzy  the  re- 
action destroyed  itself;  evangelical  faith  received  its  baptism 
of  blood  and  fire  and  evinced  its  truth  and  power  by  the  forti- 
tude of  its  martyrs. 

In  1557  the  queen's  infatuation  for  her  Spanish  partner 
involved  her  in  a  disastrous  war  with  France  in  the  course  of 
which  Calais  and  Guisnes,  last  remnants  of  once  broad  posses- 
sions, were  lost  to  the  English  crown. 

Worn  out  with  ill  health  and  depression  of  spirits,  full  of 
misgivings  as  to  the  impending  failure  of  her  whole  policy  and 
repining  at  Philip's  continued  absence,  Mary  died,  a  disap- 
pointed woman,  in  the  month  of  November,  1558.  The  tidings 
of  her  death  were  brought  to  her  sister  Elizabeth  as  she  was 
walking  under  the  autumn  oaks  at  Hatfield.  The  Middle  Ages 
were  over  forever. 


ADVERTISEMENTS 


SKETCH   OF  THE 
PHILOSOPHY  OF  AMERICAN    LITERATURE. 

By  GREENOUGH  WHITE,  A.M. 


12mo.    Flexible  cloth,    iv  +  66  pages.    Introduction  price,  30  cents. 
By  mail,  postpaid,  35  cents. 

This  essay  points  out  the  connection  between  our  country's 
literature  and  history,  and  shows  how  new  forms  in  letters 
and  arts  have  arisen  as  advancing  thought  required.  It  may 
be  used  as  a  key  to  the  whole  subject,  as  well  as  to  the 
excellent  and  extended  treatises  upon  it  and  the  numerous 
compilations  that  have  recently  appeared.  It  is  a  book  that 
will  interest  the  general  reader  (it  can  be  read  at  a  single 
sitting),  and  the  experienced  teacher  will  find  it  highly  valu- 
able in  inculcating  in  more  advanced  classes  habits  of  sound 
and  scholarly  appreciation  of  American  intellectual  life. 


Professor  Barrett  Wendell:  As  a 

guide  to  study  I  should  think  the  book  ad- 
mirable. It  is  well-digested  in  substance, 
rationally  put  together  from  beginning  to 
end,  and  written  in  a  perfectly  direct,  fine 
style. 

Professor  F.  J.  Child  (in  a  letter  to  the 
author) :  I  think  you  are  a  little  incautious 
in  your  preface.  But  when  we  come  to 
the  history  you  are  entirely  temperate  and 
discriminating.  Your  rapid  sketch  pre- 
sents the  production  of  two  hundred  years 
lucidly  and  very  agreeably. 

Professor  Charles  F.  Richardson, 

author  of  a  "  History  of  American  Litera- 
ture "  :  It  is  refreshing,  when  so  much  so- 
called  "criticism"  is  second-hand,  to 
come  upon  a  discussion  like  this,  present- 
ing conclusions  often  new  and  always 
based  on  direct  reading. 

Professor  Moses  Coit  Tyler,  author 

of  a  "  History  of  American  Colonial  Litera- 
ture "  :  I  can  honestly  say  that  I  am  struck 
most  agreeably  by  the  soundness  of  its 
fundamental  conception  of  the  spirit  and 
motive  of  American  Literature.  It  is 
much  to  be  wished  that  our  people  could 


catch  that  fruitful  idea  here  properly  put 
at  the  front,  that  there  is  a  living  and  illu- 
minating connection  between  our  country's 
history  and  its  literature. 

Mr.  Edmund  C.  Stedman,  author  of 
"  Poets  of  America,"  etc.,  etc.  :  The  precis 
seems  to  me  to  be  successful  and  to  go  to 
the  root  of  the  matter  —  i.e.  to  show  the 
philosophy  of  the  development  of  the  suc- 
cessive phases  of  our  national  literature. 

Phillips  Brooks :  I  am  much  interested 
by  the  philosophical  spirit  in  which  the 
treatise  is  conceived,  and  am  sure  that  its 
readers  will  thank  its  author  for  much  sug- 
gestion and  food  for  thought. 

Oliver  Wendell  Holmes :  An  interest- 
ing study  of  some  of  our  earlier  and  more 
recent  authors. 

John  Greenleaf  Whittier:  It  was 

difficult  to  compress  in  the  space  of  a  brief 
essay  all  that  might  be  said  of  the  develop- 
ment and  trend  of  our  literature  and 
thought,  but  so  far  as  it  goes  it  is  a  valuable 
and  well-considered  paper  in  proof  of  the 
fact  of  an  unborrowed  and  independent 
American  Literature. 


GINN  &  COMPANY,  Publishers,  Boston,  New  York,  Chicago,  London, 


10 


HIGHER    ENGLISH. 


Minto's  Manual  of  English  Prose  Literature. 

Designed  mainly  to  show  characteristics  of  style.  By  WILLIAM  MINTO, 
late  Professor  of  Logic  and  English  Literature,  University  of  Aberdeen, 
Scotland.  12mo.  Cloth.  566  pages.  Mailing  price,  $1.65 ;  for  intro- 
duction, $1.50. 

HHHE  main  design  is  to  assist  in  directing  students  in  English 
composition  to  the  merits  and  defects  of  the  principal  writers 
of  prose,  enabling  them,  in  some  degree  at  least,  to  acquire  the  one 
and  avoid  the  other.  The  Introduction  analyzes  style :  elements 
of  style,  qualities  of  style,  kinds  of  composition.  Part  First  gives 
exhaustive  analyses  of  De  Quincey,  Macaulay,  and  Carlyle.  These 
serve  as  a  key  to  all  the  other  authors  treated.  Part  Second  takes 
up  the  prose  authors  in  historical  order,  from  the  fourteenth  cen- 
tury up  to  the  early  part  of  the  nineteenth. 

Hiram  Corson,  Professor  of  Eng- 
lish Literature,  Cornell  University : 
Without  going  outside  of  this  book, 
an  earnest  student  could  get  a  knowl- 
edge of  English  prose  styles,  based 
on  the  soundest  principles  of  criti- 
cism, such  as  he  could  not  get  in  any 
twenty  volumes  which  I  know  of. 

Katharine  Lee  Bates,  Professor 
of  English,  Wellesley  College :  It  is 
of  sterling  value. 

Minto's  Characteristics  of  the  English  Poets. 

From  Chaucer  to  Shirley. 

By  WILLIAM  MINTO,  late  Professor  of  Logic  and  English  Literature, 
University  of  Aberdeen,  Scotland,  12mo.  Cloth,  xi  +  382  pages. 
Mailing  price,  $1.65 ;  for  introduction,  $1.50. 

chief  object  of  the  author  has  been  to  bring  into  as  clear 
light  as  possible  the  characteristics  of  the  several  poets  within 
the  period  chosen.  As  a  secondary  object  he  endeavors  to  trace 
how  far  each  poet  was  influenced  by  his  predecessors  and  con- 
temporaries. 

College  Requirements  in  English. 

Entrance  Examinations.     Second  Series. 

By  Rev.  ARTHUR  WENTWORTH  EATON,  Instructor  in  English  in  the 
Cutler  School,  New  York.  12mo.  Cloth.  104  pages.  Mailing  price, 
$1.20;  for  introduction,  $1.12. 


J.  Scott  Clark,  formerly  Prof essor 
of  Rhetoric,  Syracuse  University  : 
We  have  now  given  Minto's  English 
Prose  a  good  trial,  and  I  am  so  much 
pleased  that  I  want  some  more  of  the 
same. 

A.  W.  Long,  formerly  of  Wofford 
College,  Spartariburg,  S.C.;  I  have 
used  Minto's  English  Poets  and  Eng- 
lish Prose  the  past  year,  and  am 
greatly  pleased  with  the  results. 


HIGHER   ENGLISH.  11 

Selections  in  English  Prose  from  Elizabeth  to 

Victoria.     1580-1880. 

By  JAMES  M.  GABNETT,  Professor  of  the  English  Language  and  Liter- 
ature in  the  University  of  Virginia.  12mo.  Cloth,  ix-j-701  pages. 
By  mail,  $1.65:  for  introduction,  $1.50. 

rpHE  selections  are  accompanied  by  such  explanatory  notes  as 
have  been  deemed  necessary,  and  will  average  some  twenty 
pages  each.  The  object  is  to  provide  students  with  the  texts 
themselves  of  the  most  prominent  writers  of  English  prose  for 
the  past  three  hundred  years,  in  selections  of  sufficient  length  to 
be  characteristic  of  the  author,  and,  when  possible,  they  are  com- 
plete works  or  sections  of  works. 


H.  N.  Ogden,  formerly  of  W.  Vir- 
ginia Univ. :  The  book  fulfills  my  ex- 
pectations in  every  respect,  and  will 
become  an  indispensable  help  in  the 


F.  B.  Gummere,  Prof,  of  English, 
Haverford  College:  I  like  the  plan, 
the  selections,  and  the  making  of  the 
book. 


work  of  our  senior  English  class. 

Macau  lay's  Essay  on  Milton. 

Edited,  with  Introduction  and  Notes,  by  HERBERT  A.  SMITH,  Instructor 
in   English  in  Yale  University.     12mo.    Paper.  pages.    Mailing 

price,       cents ;  for  introduction,       cents. 

A  CONVENIENT  and  well-edited  edition  of  Macaulay's  masterly 
essay  on  Milton.     The  introduction  and  notes  are  especially 
valuable  to  students. 

Defoe's  Journal  of  the  Plague  Year. 

History  of  the  Plague  in  London. 

Edited  by  BYRON   S.  HURLBUT,  Instructor  in  English   in  Harvard 
University.     12mo.     Cloth.  pages.     Mailing  price,        cents;   for 

introduction,       cents. 

rpHE  book  is  intended  to  meet  the  requirements  of  students  pre- 
paring  to   take   the  college  entrance  examinations,   and   to 
supply  a  convenient  edition  for  general  use. 

Biography.       Phillips  Exeter  Lectures. 

By  Rev.  PHILLIPS  BROOKS,  D.D.    12mo.    Paper.    30  pages.    Mailing 
price,  12  cents;  for  introduction,  10  cents. 


12 


HIGHER    ENGLISH. 


The  Art  of  Poetry : 


The  Poetical  Treatises  of  Horace,  Vida,  and  Boileau,  with  the  trans- 
lations by  Howes,  Pitt,  and  Soame. 

Edited  by 'ALBERT  S.  COOK,  Professor  of  the  English  Language  and 
Literature  in  Yale  University.  12mo.  Cloth.  Iviii  +  303  pages.  Mailing 
price,  $1.25;  for  introduction,  $1.12. 


Bliss  Perry,  Prof,  of  English, 
Princeton  University :  The  fullness 
and  accuracy  of  the  references  in  the 
notes  is  a  testimony  to  his  patience 


as  well  as  his  scholarship.  ...  I 
wish  to  express  my  admiration  of 
such  faithful  and  competent  edit- 
ing. 


Shelley's  Defense  of  Poetry. 


Edited,  with  Introduction  and  Notes,  by  ALBERT  S.  COOK,  Professor  of 
English  in  Yale  University.  12mo.  Cloth,  xxvi  +  86  pages.  Price 
by  mail,  60  cents;  for  introduction,  50  cents. 


John  F.  Genung,  Prof,  of  Rhetoric, 
Amherst  College:  By  his  excellent 
editions  of  these  three  works,  Pro- 
fessor Cook  is  doing  invaluable 
service  for  the  study  of  poetry.  The 
works  themselves,  written  by  men 
who  were  masters  alike  of  poetry 
and  prose,  are  standard  as  litera- 


ture; and  in  the  introduction  and 
notes,  which  evince  in  every  part  the 
thorough  and  sympathetic  scholar, 
as  also  in  the  beautiful  form  given 
to  the  books  by  the  printer  and 
binder,  the  student  has  all  the  help 
to  the  reading  of  them  that  he  can 
desire. 


Cardinal  Newman's  Essay  on  Poetry. 

With  reference  to  Aristotle's  Poetics.  Edited,  with  Introduction  and 
Notes,  by  ALBERT  S.  COOK,  Professor  of  English  in  Yale  University. 
8vo.  Limp  cloth,  x  -J-  36  pages.  Mailing  price,  35  cents ;  for  intro- 
duction, 30  cents. 

Add/son's  Criticisms  on  Paradise  Lost 

Edited  by  ALBERT  S.  COOK,  Professor  of  the  English  Language  and 
Literature  in  Yale  University.  12mo.  Cloth,  xxiv+200  pages. 
Mailing  price,  $1.10;  for  introduction,  $1.00. 

V.  D.  Scudder,  Instructor  in  Eng 
lish  Literature,  Wellesley  College :  It 


be  welcome  as  an  addition  to  our 
store  of  text-books. 


seems  to  me  admirably  edited  and  to 

What  is  Poetry  ?  "    Leigh  Hunt's  Answer  to 

the  Question,  including  Remarks  on  Versification. 
Edited  by  ALBERT  S.  COOK,  Professor  of  the  English  Language  and 
Literature  in  Yale  University.      12mo.     Cloth.     104  pages.     Mailing 
price,  60  cents ;  for  introduction,  50  cents. 


Bliss  Perry,  Prof,  of  Oratory, 
Princeton  University,  Princeton, 
N.J. :  Professor  Cook's  beautiful 


little  book  will  prove  to  the  teacher 
one  of  the  most  useful  volumes  in 
the  series  it  represents. 


HIGHER   ENGLISH. 


13 


Essays  and  Letters  selected  from  the  Writings 

of  John  Ruskin. 

With  Introductory  Interpretations  and  Annotations.  By  Lois  G. 
HUFFORD,  Teacher  of  English  Literature  in  the  Indianapolis  High 
School.  12mo.  Cloth,  xxix  x  441  pages.  Illustrated.  Mailing  price, 
$1.10;  for  introduction,  $1.00. 

rpHESE  essays  are  characteristic  expressions  of  Ruskin's  viewc 
on  social  questions  and  ethical  culture.  They  are  accom- 
panied by  interpretative  introductions  and  explanatory  notes. 
The  main  introduction  gives  Ruskin's  theory  of  life  and  art,  a 
biographical  sketch,  showing  what  influences  contributed  to  the 
formation  of  his  character,  and  the  characteristics  of  his  literary 
style. 

The  Beginnings  of  the  English  Romantic  Moue- 

ment, 

A  Study  in  Eighteenth  Century  Literature.  By  WILLIAM  LYON 
PHELPS,  Ph.D.,  Instructor  in  English  Literature,  Yale  University. 
12mo..  Cloth,  viii+192  pages.  Mailing  price,  $1.10;  for  introduc- 
tion, $1.00. 


book  is  a  -study  of  the  germs  of  English  Romanticism 
between    1725    and    1765.     No  other  work  in  this  field  has 
ever  been  published,  hence  the  results  given  here  are  all  the  fruit 
of  first-hand  investigation. 

It  is  believed  that  this  book  is  a  contribution  to  our  knowledge 
of  English  literary  history  ;  and  it  will  be  especially  valuable 
to  advanced  classes  of  students  who  are  interested  in  the  develop- 
ment of  literature. 


Archibald  MacMechan,  Prof,  of 
English,  Dalhousie  College,  Halifax, 
N.S. :  It  is  a  valuable  contribution 
to  the  history  of  English  literature 
in  the  eighteenth  century. 


Barrett  Wendell,  Prof,  of  Eng- 
lish, Harvard  University :  Among 
the  most  scholarly  and  suggestive 
books  of  literary  history. 


Studies  in  the  Evolution  of  English  Criticism. 

By  LAURA  JOHNSON  WYLIE,  Graduate  Student  of  English  in  Yale 
University.  12mo.  Cloth,  viii  +  212  pages.  Mailing  price,  $1.10  ; 
for  introduction,  $1.00. 

PPHE  critical  principles  of  Dryden  and  Coleridge,  and  the  con- 
ditions   on  which   the    evolution    of   their   opposite    theories 
depended,  are  the  subjects  chiefly  discussed  in  this  book. 


14 


HIGHER    ENGLISH. 


A  Primer  of  English  Verse. 


By  HIRAM  CORSON,  Professor  of  English  Literature  in  Cornell  Univer- 
sity.  12mo.  Cloth.  iv  +  232  pages.  By  mail,  $1.10;  for  introduction, 
$1.00. 

leading  purpose  of  this  volume  is  to  introduce  the  student 
to  the  aesthetic  and  organic  character  of  English  Verse  —  to 
cultivate  his  susceptibility  to  verse  as  an  inseparable  part  of  poetic 
expression.  To  this  end,  the  various  effects  provided  for  by  the 
poet,  either  consciously  or  unconsciously  on  his  part,  are  given  for 
the  student  to  practice  upon,  until  those  effects  come  out  distinctly 
to  his  feelings. 


J.  H.  Gilinore,  Prof,  of  English, 
University  of  Eo Chester :  It  gives  a 
thoroughly  adequate  discussion  of 
the  principal  forms  of  English  verse. 

The  University  Magazine,  New 
York:  Professor  Corson  has  given 
us  a  most  interesting  and  thorough 
treatise  on  the  characteristics  and 


Analytics  of  Literature. 


uses  of  English  metres.  He  dis- 
cusses the  force  and  effects  of  vari- 
ous metres,  giving  examples  of  usage 
from  various  poets.  The  book  will 
be  of  great  use  to  both  the  critical 
student  and  to  those  who  recognize 
that  poetry,  like  music,  is  constructed 
on  scientific  and  precise  principles. 


A  Manual  for  the  Objective  Study  of  English  Prose  and  Poetry.  By 
L.  A.  SHERMAN,  Professor  of  English  Literature  in  the  University  of 
Nebraska.  12mo.  Cloth,  xx  +  468  pages.  Mailing  price,  $1.40;  for 
introduction,  $1.25. 


book  was  written  to  embody  a  new  system  of  teaching 
literature  that  has  been  tried  with  great  success.  The  chief 
features  of  the  system  are  the  recognition  of  elements,  and  insuring 
an  experience  of  each,  on  the  part  of  the  learner,  according  to  the 
laboratory  plan.  The  principal  stages  in  the  evolution  of  form 
in  literature  are  made  especial  subjects  of  study. 


Edwin  M.  Hopkins,  Instructor  of 
English,  University  of  Kansas:  I 
am  delighted  with  the  fruitful  and 
suggestive  way  in  which  he  has 
treated  the  subject. 

Bliss  Perry,  Prof  essor  of  English, 
Princeton  University :  I  have  found 


it  an  extremely  suggestive  book.  .  . 
It  has  a  great  deal  of  originality  and 
earnestness. 

Daniel  Dorchester,  Jr.,  Prof,  of 
Rhetoric  and  English  Literature, 
Boston  University :  It  is  a  very  use- 
ful book.  I  shall  recommend  it. 


HIGHER   ENGLISH.  15 

Fiue  Short  Courses  of  Reading  in  English  Litera- 

ture. 

With  Biographical  and  Critical  References.  By  C.  T.  WINCHESTER, 
Professor  of  English  Literature  in  Wesleyan  University.  Sq.  16mo. 
Cloth,  v  +  99  pages.  Mailing  price,  45  cents  j  for  introduction,  40  cents. 


nHHIS  little  book  lays  out  five  short  courses  of  reading  from  the 
most  prominent  writers  in  pure  literature  of  the  last  three 
centuries,  beginning  with  Marlowe  and  ending  with  Tennyson. 
The  book  contains  also  information  as  to  the  best  editions  for 
student  use,  with  extended  and  well  chosen  lists  of  critical  and 
biographical  authorities. 


Le  Baron  K.  Briggs,  Professor  of 
English,  Harvard  University :  I  am 


much  pleased  with  it.    It  cannot  help 
being  useful. 


Synopsis  of  English  and  American  Literature. 

By  G.  J.  SMITH,  Instructor  of  English,  Washington  (D.C.)  High  School. 
8vo.    Cloth.     125  pages.    By  mail,  90  cents;  for  introduction,  80  cents. 

/^NE  finds  here  in  every  case  the  author's  full  name,  the  dates 
of  birth  and  death,  the  class  of  writers  to  which  he  belongs, 
the  chronological  place  of  that  class  in  the  development  of  litera- 
ture, his  most  important  works,  his  most  distinguished  contem- 
poraries, the  leading  events  of  the  time,  and,  in  most  cases  a  few 
clear  words  of  explanation  or  criticism. 
W.  B.  Chamberlain,  formerly  Prof '. 


ofEheloric,Oberlin  College:  Its  clear- 
ness, compactness,  and  readiness  for 
reference,  must  make  it  one  of  the 
most  useful  tools  for  either  teacher 
or  student.  It  gives  a  vast  amount 


of  most  valuable  information  in  the 
most  economical  manner  possible.  A 
very  valuable  feature  is  its  correla- 
tion of  literary  with  political  and 
general  historical  events.  I  regard 
it  as  a  decided  success. 


Shakespeare's  Tragedy  of  Hamlet. 

For  the  use  of  Colleges,  High  Schools,  Academies  and  Clubs.  By  CAR- 
ROLL LEWIS  MAXCY,  A.B.,  Associate  Principal  and  Instructor  in  Eng- 
lish, Troy  (N.Y.)  Academy.  Square  lOmo.  Cloth.  200  pages.  Mail- 
ing price,  50  cents;  for  introduction,  45  cents. 

AT  the  close  of  each  scene  is  appended  an  extensive  body  of 
questions  covering  all  the  points  of  action,  and  leading  to 
a  thorough  appreciation  and  familiarity  with  the  play. 

The  Philosophy  of  American  Literature. 

By  GREENOUGH  WHITE,  A.M.,  Professor  in  Univ.  of  the  South.  12mo. 
Flexible  cloth,  iv  +  66  pages.  By  mail,  35  cents ;  for  in  trod.,  30  cents. 


16  HIGHER   ENGLISH. 

The  Best  Elizabethan  Plays. 

Edited  with  an  Introduction  by  WILLIAM  R.  THATEE.    12mo.    Cloth, 
611  pages.    By  mail,  $1.40;  for  introduction,  $1.25. 

rPHE  selection  comprises  The  Jew  of  Malta,  by  Marlowe;  The 
Alchemist,  by  Ben  Jonson ;  Philaster,  by  Beaumont  and  Fletcher; 
The  Two  Noble  Kinsmen,  by  Fletcher  and  Shakespeare ;  and  The 
Duchess  of  Malfi,  by  Webster.  It  thus  affords  not  only  the  best 
specimen  of  the  dramatic  work  of  each  of  the  five  Elizabethan 
poets  who  rank  next  to  Shakespeare,  but  also  a  general  view  of  the 
development  of  English  drama  from  its  rise  in  Marlowe  to  its  last 
strong  expression  in  Webster. 


Felix  E.  Schelling,  Professor  of 
English,  University  of  Pennsyl- 
vania: All  professors  of  English 
literature  must  welcome  such  intel- 
ligent and  scholarly  editions  of  our 
enduring  classics. 


Charles  F.  Richardson,  Professor 
of  English,  Dartmouth  College:  The 
book  is  an  excellent  one,  well  edited, 
equipped  with  brief  and  sensible 
notes,  and  introduced  by  a  preface 
of  real  critical  insight. 


A  Method  of  English  Composition. 

By  T.  WHITING  BANCROFT,  late  Professor  of  Rhetoric  and  English 
Literature  in  Brown  University.  12mo.  Cloth.  101  pages.  Mailing 
price,  55  cents ;  for  introduction,  50  cents. 

Notes  on  English  Literature. 

By  FRED  PARKER  EMERY,  Professor  of  Rhetoric,  Dartmouth  College. 
12mo.  Cloth.  152  pages.  By  mail,  $1.10;  for  introduction,  $1.00. 

HHHIS  book  follows  the  critical,  comparative,  and  philosophical 
method  of  the  best  universities,  and  combines  the  advantages 
of  the  tabulated  synopsis  of  authors  and  books  with  those  of  the 
critical  literary  history 

The  Rhetoric  Tablet 

By  F.  N.  SCOTT,  Assistant  Professor  of  Rhetoric,  University  of  Michi- 
gan, and  J.  V.  DENNEY,  Associate  Professor  of  Rhetoric,  Ohio  State 
University.  No.  1.  5|x 9  inches.  White  paper  (ruled).  No.  2.  Tinted 
paper  (unruled).  7^x9|  inches.  Sixty  sheets  in  each.  Mailing  price, 
20  cents ;  for  introduction,  15  cents. 

AS  a  substitute  in  English  work  for  composition-books  or  other 
manuscript-paper,  the  Rhetoric  Tablet  offers  the  following 
advantages:  (1)  Uniform  paper  throughout  the  school,  (2)  a 
broad  margin  for  corrections,  (3)  a  minute  and  systematic 
analysis  of  the  most  common  errors  in  composition,  (4)  references 
to  standard  rhetorics. 


22 


HIGHER    ENGLISH. 


The  Classic  Myths  in  English  Literature. 

Based  chiefly  on  Bulfinch's  "  Age  of  Fable."  Accompanied  by  an  inter- 
pretative and  illustrative  commentary.  Edited  by  CHARLES  MILLS 
GAYLEY,  Professor  of  the  English  Language  and  Literature,  Univer- 
sity of  California.  12mo.  Half  leather,  xlv  +  540  pages.  Mailing 
price,  $1.65;  for  introduction,  $1.50.  New  Edition,  with  16  full-page 
illustrations. 


work  is  recommended  both  as  the  best  manual  of  mythol- 
ogy and  as  indispensable  to  the  student  of  English  literature. 
Some  special  features  are  : 

1.  An  introduction  on  the  indebtedness  of  English  poetry  to 
the  literature  of  fable,  and   on  methods  of  teaching  mythology. 

2.  An  elementary  account  of  myth-making  and  of  the  prin- 
cipal poets  of  mythology,  and  of  the  beginnings  of  the  world,  of 
gods  and  of  men  among  the  Greeks. 

3.  A   thorough    revision   and    systematization   of    Bulfinch's 
Stories  of  Gods  and  Heroes:    with  additional  stories,  and  with 
selections  from  English  poems  based  upon  the  myths. 

4.  Illustrative    cuts    from    Baumeister,    Roscher,    and    other 
standard  authorities  on  mythology. 

5.  The  requisite  maps. 

6.  Certain  necessary  modifications  in  Bulfinch's  treatment  of 
the  mythology  of  nations  other  than  the  Greeks  and  Romans. 

7.  Notes,  following  the  te?:t  (as  in  the  school  editions  of  Latin 
and  Greek  authors),  containing  an  historical  and  interpretative 
commentary  upon    certain   myths,  supplementary   poetical   cita- 
tions, a  list  of  the  better  known  allusions  to  mythological  fiction, 
references  to  works  of  art,  and  hints  to  teachers  and  students. 


Albert  S.  Cook,  Professor  of  the 
English  Language  and  Literature, 
Yale  University :  I  can  cordially  rec- 
ommend it  to  colleges  and  schools. 
It  is  scholarly,  attractive,  stimu- 
lating, and  refining. 

C.  K.  Adams,  President  Univer- 
sity of  Wisconsin:  An  admirable 
volume.  It  is  just  what  hundreds 
of  thousands  of  students  need. 

William  T.  Harris,  United  States 
Commissioner  of  Education:  It  is 


the  most  satisfactory  book  yet  pub- 
lished on  this  theme.  .  .  .  Every 
reader  of  literature  should  have 
this  book  within  reach  on  his 
table. 

Katharine  Lee  Bates,  Professor 
of  English  Literature,  Wellesley  Col- 
lege :  It  is  well  worth  doing  and 
well  done. 

F.  J.  Miller,  Professor  of  Latin, 
University  of  Chicago:  I  am  more 
than  charmed  with  it. 


26 


HIGHER    ENGLISH. 


ATHENJEUM    PRESS    SERIES. 

ISSUED   UNDER  THE  GENERAL  EDITORSHIP  OF 

PROFESSOR  GEORGE  LYMAN  KITTREDGE,  of  Harvard  University, 

AND 
PROFESSOR  C.  T.  WINCHESTER,  of  Wesleyan  University. 

FT  is  proposed  to  issue  a  series  of  carefully  edited  works  in 
English  Literature,  under  the  above  title.  This  series  is  in- 
tended primarily  for  use  in  colleges  and  higher  schools  ;  but  it 
will  furnish  also  to  the  general  reader  a  library  of  the  best  things 
in  English  letters  in  editions  at  once  popular  and  scholarly.  The 
works  selected  will  represent,  with  some  degree  of  completeness, 
the  course  of  English  Literature  from  Chaucer  to  our  own  times. 
The  volumes  will  be  moderate  in  price,  yet  attractive  in  appear- 
ance, and  as  nearly  as  possible  uniform  in  size  and  style.  Each 
volume  will  contain,  in  addition  to  an  unabridged  and  critically 
accurate  text,  an  Introduction  and  a  body  of  Notes.  The  amount 
and  nature  of  the  annotation  will,  of  course,  vary  with  the  age 
and  character  of  the  work  edited.  The  notes  will  be  full  enough 
to  explain  every  difficulty  of  language,  allusion,  or  interr>retation 
Full  glossaries  will  be  furnished  when  necessary. 

The  introductions  are  meant  to  be  a  distinctive  feature  of  the 
series.  Each  introduction  will  give  a  brief  biographical  sketch  of 
the  author  edited,  and  a  somewhat  extended  study  of  his  genius, 
his  relation  to  his  age,  and  his  position  in  English  literary  history. 
The  introductory  matter  will  usually  include  a  bibliography  of 
the  author  or  the  work  in  hand,  as  well  as  a  select  list  of  critical 
and  biographical  books  and  articles.  See  a/.so  Announcements. 

Sidney's  Defense  of  Poesy. 

Edited  with  an  Introduction  and  Notes  by  ALBERT  S.  Cook,  Professor 
of  English  in  Yale  University.  12mo.  Cloth,  xlv  +  103  pages.  By 
mail,  <)0  cents;  for  introduction,  80  cents. 


William  Minto,  Late  Prof,  of  Lit- 
erature, University  of  Aberdeen:  It 
seems  to  me  to  be  a  very  thorough 
and  instructive  piece  of  work.  The 
interests  of  the  student  are  consulted 


in  every  sentence  of  the  Introduction 
and  Notes,  and  the  paper  of  ques- 
tions is  admirable  as  a  guide  to  the 
thorough  study  of  the  substance  of 
the  essay. 


HIGHER    ENGLISH. 


27 


Ben  Jonson's  Timber:  or  Discoveries 

Made  upon  Men  and  Matter,  as  they  have  Flowed  out  of  his  Daily 
Readings,  or  had  their  Reflux  to  his  Peculiar  Notions  of  the  Times. 

Edited,  with  Introduction  and  Notes,  by  FELIX  E.  SCHELLING,  Profes- 
sor in  the  University  of  Pennsylvania.  12mo.  Cloth,  xxxviii  +  166 
pages.  Mailing  price,  90  cents  ;  for  introduction,  80  cents. 

is  the  first  attempt  to  edit  a  long-neglected  English  classic, 
which  needs  only  to  be  better  known  to  take  its  place  among 
the  best  examples  of  the  height  of  Elizabethan  prose.  The  intro- 
duction and  a  copious  body  of  notes  have  been  framed  with  a 
view  to  the  intelligent  understanding  of  an  author  whose  wide 
learning  and  wealth  of  allusion  make  him  the  fittest  exponent  of 
the  scholarship  as  well  as  the  literary  style  and  feeling  of  his  age. 


Edward  Dowden,  Prof,  of  English, 
Trinity  College,  Dublin,  Ireland  :  It 
is  a  matter  for  rejoicing  that  so  valu- 
able and  interesting  a  piece  of  liter- 


ature as  this  prose  work  of  Jonson 
should  be  made  easily  accessible,  and 
should  have  all  the  advantages  of 
scholarly  editing. 


Selections  from  the  Essays  of  Francis  Jeffrey. 

Edited,  with  Introduction  and  Notes,  by  LEWIS  E.  GATES,  Instructor  in 
English  in  Harvard  University.  12mo.  Cloth,  xlv  +  213  pages.  By 
mail,  $1.00;  for  introduction,  *K)  cents. 

fPHE  selections  are  chosen  to  illustrate  the  qualities  of  Jeffrey's 
style  and  his  range  and  methods  as  a  literary  critic.  The 
introduction  gives  a  brief  sketch  of  the  history  of  Reviews  in 
England  down  to  1802*  and  suggests  some  of  the  more  import- 
ant changes  in  critical  methods  and  in  the  relations  between  critic 
and  public  which  were  brought  about  by  the  establishment  of  the 
Edinburgh  Review.  This  volume  is  especially  valuable  for  classes 
that  are  beginning  the  independent  study  of  literary  topics  and 
methods  of  criticism. 


Charton  Collins,  London,  Author 
of  "Bolinybroke  and  Voltaire," 
"Jonathan  Swift,"  etc. :  The  intro- 
duction gives  succinctly  and  clearly 
all  the  facts  which  enable  students 
to  understand  Jeffrey's  character- 


istics as  a  man,  his  relative  position 
to  his  contemporaries,  his  excellence, 
his  deficiencies  and  his  limitations. 
.  .  .  I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying 
that  the  book  supplies  a  real  want, 
and  supplies  it  excellently. 


28  HIGHER   ENGLISH. 

Old  English  Ballads. 

Selected  and  edited,  with  Notes  and  Introduction,  by  Professor  F.  B. 
GUMMERE  of  Haverford  College.  12mo.  Cloth,  xcviii  +  380  pages. 
By  mail,  $1.35;  for  introduction,  $1.25. 

fPHE  aim  has  been  to  present  the  best  of  the-  traditional  English 
and  Scottish  ballads  and  also  to  make  the  collection  repre- 
sentative. The  pieces  have  been  arranged  by  subject,  but  not 
divided  into  groups  or  classes.  The  glossary  will  be  found  full 
but  simple.  Philological  details  have  been  given  only  when  the 
explanation  of  the  passage  rendered  them  necessary.  The  notes 
have  been  prepared  according  to  the  same  principle,  —  the  eluci- 
dation of  the  text  and  the  thought.  The  introduction  presents  a 
detailed  study  of  popular  poetry  and  the  views  of  its  chief  critics, 
with  notes  on  metre,  style,  etc. 


Lever  ett  Spring,  Professor  of  Rhet- 
oric, Williams  College :  A  thorough 
and  scholarly  piece  of  literary  work. 

Isaac  N.  Demmon,  Professor  of 


Michigan:  Admirably  done  through- 
out and  seems  to  supply  an  im- 
portant piece  of  apparatus  for  the 
teaching  of  English  in  our  schools. 


English    Literature,    University  of 

Selections  from  the  Poetry  and  Prose  of  Thomas 

Cray. 

Edited,  with  Introduction  and  Notes,  by  WM.  LYON  PHELPS,  Instructor 
in  English  Literature  at  Yale  College.  12mo.  Cloth.  1  + 179  pages. 
By  mail,  $1.00 ;  for  introduction,  90  cents. 

rpHIS  volume  contains  all  of  the  poems  of  Gray  that  are  of  any 
real  interest  and  value,  and  the  prose  selections  include  the 
Journal  in  the  Lakes  entire,  and  extracts  from  his  Letters  of  auto- 
biographical and  literary  interest.  The  Introduction,  besides 
containing  a  Life  of  Gray,  a  Bibliography,  etc.,  gives  a  summary 
of  his  historical  significance,  with  a  critical  review  of  his  work. 
The  Notes  on  the  Prose  are  very  brief,  and  simply  explanatory. 
This  volume  of  Gray,  besides  being  adapted  for  the  general  reader, 
will  be  especially  useful  in  schools  and  colleges. 


Hiram  Corson,  Professor  of  Eng- 
lish, Cornell  University,  Ithaca, 
N.Y.:  The  editorial  part  of  this 
work  is  admirably  done. 


George    C.  Chase,  President   of 

Bates  College,  Lewiston,  Me. :  An 
excellent  text,  competent  editing 
and  scholarly  notes. 


HIGHER    ENGLISH.  29 

A  Book  of  Elizabethan  Lyrics. 

Selected  and  edited,  with  Introduction,  Notes  and  Indices,  by  FELIX  E. 
SCHELLING,  Professor  of  English  Literature  in  the  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania. 12mo.  Cloth.  Ixix  +  327  pages.  By  mail,  $1.25 ;  for  intro- 
duction, $1.12. 

T1HE  selections  have  been  drawn  from  the  works  of  individual 
authors,  from  Plays  and  Masques,  and  from  the  Miscellanies, 
Song  Books  and  Sonnet  Sequences  of  the  age:  each  selection  is 
given  entire.  The  poems  are  arranged  as  nearly  chronologically 
as  is  possible  in  order  that  the  collection  may  be  representative. 
The  introduction  sets  forth  the  general  nature  of  the  Elizabethan 
lyric  in  its  thought  and  form,  briefly  treating  of  the  changes 
wrought  in  style  and  versification,  the  sources  of  the  selections, 
questions  of  text  and  authorship. 

Herrich:  Selections  from  the  Hesperides  and  the 

Noble  Numbers. 

Edited  with  Introduction,  Notes,  and  Glossary,  by  Professor  EDWARD 
E.  HALE,  Jr.,  of  the  State  University  of  Iowa.     12mo.    Cloth, 
pages.    By  mail,  ;  for  introduction, 

rpHE  editor  has  made  a  selection  of  Herrick's  best  poems.  In 
the  introduction  he  endeavors  to  mark  the  varied  develop- 
ment of  Herrick's  poetic  thought  and  to  find  bases  for  proper  infer- 
ence concerning  the  poet's  life.  He  has,  however,  kept  in  mind 
throughout  that  Herrick  is  of  real  interest  as  a  consummate  artist 
of  exquisite  quality,  and  not  as  an  available  object  for  critical 
methods. 

Carlyle's  Sartor  Resartus. 

Edited,  with  an  Introduction  and  Commentary,  by  ARCHIBALD  MAC 
MECHAN,  Munro  Professor  of  English  in  Dalhousie  College,  Halifax, 
N.S.  12mo.  Cloth.  pages.  By  mail,  ;  for  introduction 

gARTOR  RESARTUS  is  Carlyle's  first  important  book.  It 
contains  in  essence  all  his  teaching  for  his  age,  and  possesses 
also  much  interest  as  his  spiritual  autobiography.  Though  no 
book  needs  annotation  more,  on  account  of  its  many  and  remote 
allusions,  this  is  the  first  attempt  since  its  publication  to  deal  fully 
with  the  difficulties  which  it  presents. 


BOOKS  IN  HIGHER  ENGLISH. 


IntroA.  Price. 

Alexander:     Introduction  to  Browning $1.00 

Athenaeum  Press  Series  : 

Cook :  Sidney's  Defense  of  Poesy 80 

Gummere :  Old  English  Ballads 00 

Schelling:  Ben  Jonson's  Timber t        .80 

Baker :  Plot-Book  of  Some  Elizabethan  Plays .00 

Cook :  A  First  Book  in  Old  English 1.50 

Shelley's  Defense  of  Poetry 50 

The  Art  of  Poetry 1.12 

Hunt's  What  is  Poetry  ? 50 

Newman's  Aristotle's  Poetics 30 

Addison's  Criticisms  oa  Paradise  Lost 1.00 

Bacon's  Advancement  of  Learning 00 

Corson:  Primer  of  English  Verse 1.00 

Emery :  Notes  on  English  Literature 1.00 

English  Literature  Pamphlets:  Ancient  Mariner,  .05;  First 
Bunker  Hill  Address,  .10;  Essay  on  Lord  Clive, 
.15 ;  Second  Essay  on  the  Earl  of  Chatham,  .15 ; 
Burke,  I.  and  II. ;  Webster,  I.  and  II. ;  Bacon ; 
Wordsworth,  I.  and  II.;  Coleridge  and  Burns; 

Addison  and  Goldsmith Each        .15 

Fulton  &  Trueblood :  Practical  Elocution Retail      1.50 

Choice  Readings,  $1.50;  Chart  of  Vocal  Expression  .      2.00 

College  Critic's  Tablet 60 

Garnett:          English  Prose  from  Elizabeth  to  Victoria     ....      1.50 

Gayley :  Classic  Myths  in  English  Literature 1.50 

Genung :          Outlines  of  Rhetoric 1.00 

Elements  of  Rhetoric,  $1.25;  Rhetorical  Analysis      .      1.12 

Gummere :      Handbook  of  Poetics 1.00 

Hudson :          Harvard  Edition  of  Shakespeare's  Complete  Works :  — 

20  Vol.  Ed.  Cloth,  retail,  $25.00;  Half-calf,  retail .    55.00 

10  Vol.  Ed.  Cloth,  retail,  $20.00;  Half-calf,  retail  .    40.00 

Life,  Art,  and  Characters  of  Shakespeare.  2  vols.  Cloth,    4.00 

New  School  Shakespeare.  Each  play :  Paper,  .30 ;  Cloth,      .45 

Text-Book  of  Poetry ;  Text-Book  of  Prose    .    .Each      1.25 

Classical  English  Reader 1.00 

Lockwood:     Lessons  in  English,  $1.12;  Thauatopsis 10 

Maxcy :  Tragedy  of  Hamlet 45 

Minto :  Manual  of  English  Prose  Literature 1.50 

Characteristics  of  English  Poets 1.50 

Newcomer  :    Practical  Course  in  English  Composition 80 

Phelps :  English  Romantic  Movement 1.00 

Sherman :       Analytics  of  Literature 1.25 

Smith :  Synopsis  of  English  and  American  Literature  ...        .80 

Sprague  :         Milton's  Paradise  Lost  and  Lycidas 45 

Thayer :  The  Best  Elizabethan  Plays 1.25 

Thorn :  Shakespeare  and  Chaucer  Examinations 1.00 

White  :  Philosophy  of  American  Literature 30 

Whitney :        Essentials  of  English  Grammar 75 

Whitney  &  Lockwood :  English  Grammar 70 

Winchester :  Five  Short  Courses  of  Reading  in  English  Literature,        .40 

AND   OTHER   VALUABLE    WORKS. 


CINN    &   COMPANY,    Publishers, 

Boston,  New  York,  and  Chicago. 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW 

AN     INITIAL     FINE    OF    25     CENTS 

WILL   BE   ASSESSED    FOR    FA.LUR?TO 
THIS   BOOK  ON  THE   DATE  DUE 


LD  21-50m-l,'3| 


YB  73945 


